Journey

A significant characteristic of the Canon MJ Group is its closeness with customers. Accordingly, many activities within the Canon MJ Group are carried out by first listening to the voice of the customer.
Approximately 20% of the inventors of patents filed by the Canon MJ Group belong to departments other than those involved in development (such as the sales department). This shows that the entire company, from sales to development, is dedicated to activities for creating solutions to meet customer expectations.
Members of the IP Division diligently strive to understand customers’ true challenges by conducting thorough interviews with not only the development department but also the sales department to understand the nature of our customers’ businesses, issues, and desires.
Through discussions with members from various departments, ideas are generated to address the true challenges faced by customers, and patent applications are filed to protect the ideas.
The members of the IP Division find great joy in contributing to the improvement of solutions for customers' true challenges and in the utilization of acquired intellectual property to propel the business in a positive direction.
The members of the IP Division are responsible for overseeing the intellectual property activities of companies within the Canon MJ Group. Understanding not only the business activities but also the management policies of the Canon MJ Group, which is composed of companies with various business formats, is essential. In addition to focusing on the targeted technologies and businesses, collaboration with planning departments, marketing departments, legal departments, and others is crucial to consider the surrounding market and societal trends. Going forward, the IP Division at Canon MJ will aim to continue carrying out intellectual property activities in its own way centered on customer needs by maintaining collaboration with various departments.

Canon MJ's IP Division actively engages in activities related to the broader creation of intellectual property, surpassing the framework of acquiring intellectual property rights, with the aim of contributing to the company.
As part of these initiatives, in 2019, we established an organization called the New Business Development Department. Members of the IP Division are working with the goal of creating a source of intellectual property based on the expertise they have cultivated over the years. The New Business Development Department focuses on refining the members' ability to oversee the entire group, understand the business, and identify innovation, collaborating with the Ramp;D and planning departments on a daily basis.
Specifically, members of the New Business Development Department join project teams from the conceptual stage of new businesses, and leverage the knowledge and experience gained from intellectual property activities to (1) conduct market/competitive research and analysis, (2) carry out interviews with customers/users, and (3) propose new business ideas/competitive advantages. For example, they are deeply involved in market and competitive research for selecting research themes in the R&D department and activities related to commercializing research outcomes. Even during interviews, they actively participate in understanding customer insight by formulating interview content and attending worksites, which is a far different approach from the conventional method where interview results are reported retrospectively from the business department.
Some members of the New Business Development Department participate in internal entrepreneurship programs to take on the challenge of creating new businesses from scratch, continuing to hone their skills on a daily basis.
Creating new businesses is by no means an easy task, and our activities are still a work in progress. However, getting involved in business activities at this early stage also contributes to the early discovery of intellectual property. When it comes to patents in particular, by directly engaging with customer challenges, members of the IP Division can more clearly identify the points that need to be covered by rights, ultimately enhancing the quality of patents.

The Canon MJ IP Division also plays a role as the IP division for the entire Canon MJ Group, receiving numerous consultations and requests for consideration from various companies within the group. At times, we transcend the boundaries of intellectual property to support business activities.
For example, we promote various business DX initiatives to promptly respond to requests from business divisions that are actively working to meet customer expectations and to reduce the burden on the requesting business division.
Specifically, we introduce new tools for business divisions to use for various requests and applications, establish operations and implement business reforms so that we can unify and make those tools available across group companies, to enhance efficiency through DX. Through such initiatives, we aim to create an environment where sales departments, development departments, and even group companies can focus on their core business, as our important activities for supporting business.

Without constraining ourselves to the framework of intellectual property, we pool our collective wisdom every day to ensure that each business within the Canon MJ Group moves in a positive direction.