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XICA launches "Chief AI Office," an in-house team to promote AI research and development.

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We are promoting the development of AI solutions that contribute to decision-making in all aspects of business management through a "decentralized AI lead system" comprised of experts in four domains.

　　

XICA Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President and CEO: Yoshiaki Hirao; hereinafter referred to as XICA) has established an in-house team, "Chief AI Office," to promote AI research and development with the aim of improving the value provided by its solutions, effective May 1, 2026. The Chief AI Office will organically integrate the expertise of specialists in four areas: Research, Data Science, Software Engineering, and Product, and will promote research and development of AI applications that go beyond simply improving operational efficiency and contribute to management and business decision-making, thereby improving the value provided by its solutions.

Chief AI Office Member
(From left to right in the photo) CRO Kenta Murata, CDSO Tetsuya Haneda, CTO Taichi Amano, CPO Yohei Ikuchi

　　

Background of the establishment of the Chief AI Office

XICA is a data science firm that leverages "data science x consulting x software development" to provide solutions that enable enterprise-level clients to achieve a growth spiral that allows them to "continue to win" in business.

In recent years, AI has been used in business by companies of all kinds, but in most cases, it is limited to streamlining localized business processes, and currently, few companies are able to utilize it for management and business decision-making or for generating results.

However, XICA, with its mission to "deliver insights from all data," has honed its expertise over approximately 15 years in deriving insights that contribute to business growth from data held by companies. This allows XICA to utilize AI that understands a company's unique context at a high level. While simply feeding internal and external data directly into AI often yields only mediocre answers, XICA transforms data into valuable information through data science, providing context to the AI ​​and enabling innovative outputs that contribute to management and business decision-making.

After extensive testing with multiple enterprise companies, we have demonstrated that XICA's deep data science expertise and its understanding of each company's unique context are crucial elements in realizing AI utilization that contributes to management and business decision-making. Therefore, in order to more strongly promote the enhancement of value provided to client companies through the use of AI, we have established the Chief AI Office.

Overview of the Chief AI Office

A "decentralized AI lead system" where experts from four fields collaborate.

The Chief AI Office is a team comprised of experts in four key areas of technology for AI utilization in enterprises: Research, Data Science, Software Engineering, and Product.

Generally, AI research and development in companies is often structured with an individual at the top as Chief AI Officer (CAIO). However, AI research and development covers a wide range of areas, including basic research, data analysis, system implementation, and product development, and each area requires extremely deep expertise.

Therefore, XICA believes that the best approach to applying AI to business is to organically combine the results of high-level research and development in each respective field. To this end, we have established a "decentralized AI lead system" in which experts from each field come together to share and complement each other's AI research and development responsibilities.

Through this "decentralized AI lead system," XICA will translate research-level theory (Research) into practical applications through precise data analysis, scientific elucidation and implementation (Data Science), and deliver the best possible experience (Product) to society on a robust technological foundation (Software Engineering).

Overview of roles in each area

Research (Responsible: Kenta Murata, Executive Officer and CRO)

We play a key role in providing the theoretical foundation for securing long-term technological superiority, conducting research and studies on the latest papers and cutting-edge algorithms (AI architecture, technology selection, data strategy, etc.).

Data Science (Responsible: Executive Officer, CDSO Tetsuya Haneda)

We play a role in scientifically elucidating business processes and generating evidence, performing data analysis to transform vast amounts of data into valuable insights (statistical analysis, machine learning, mathematical model development, etc.).

Software Engineering (Responsible: Executive Officer & CTO, Taichi Amano)

We play a key role in optimizing computing resources and building robust system infrastructure, ensuring the social implementation and scalability of AI models (including infrastructure development, security, MLOps, and scientific decision-making implementation).

Product (Responsible: Yohei Ikuchi, Executive Officer and CPO)

This role involves verifying market suitability and overseeing UX, designing AI solutions that enhance user convenience (including AI customer value creation, product ethics, and UX integration).

The Next Development

Going forward, Chief AI Office will promote the commercialization of new AI-powered solutions, prototypes developed through collaborations with multiple enterprise companies, with the aim of officially launching them in the near future.

Comment from Taishi Korezawa, Director in charge of Development

AI research, development, and application encompass an extremely wide range of areas, from basic research and data analysis to robust system construction and implementation into superior user experiences. Orchestration of personnel with deep expertise in each area is crucial. Rather than entrusting these tasks to a single leader, we believe that a "decentralized AI leadership structure," in which four specialists in each field—Murata (CRO), Haneda (CDSO), Amano (CTO), and Ikuchi (CPO)—come together and organically combine their knowledge, is the best choice for applying AI to business.

The AI ​​technology developed by these four individuals, combined with the deep data science expertise that XICA has cultivated over many years, will provide overwhelming value to our client companies, enabling them to "continue to win" in their businesses. Please look forward to XICA's future endeavors, including the new solutions that will be officially launched soon.

Chief AI Office Member Biographies

(From left to right in the photo) CRO Kenta Murata, CDSO Tetsuya Haneda, CTO Taichi Amano, CPO Yohei Ikuchi

Executive Officer, Chief Research Officer: Kenta Murata

During his student years, he began developing Kondara MNU/Linux and participated in the development of several open-source projects. After completing his doctoral studies at Hokkaido University, he became a Ruby committer in 2010, primarily working on improvements and maintenance related to numerical functions, such as built-in numeric classes and the bigdecimal library. In 2017, he joined Speee Inc., where he worked as a full-time open-source developer, developing Ruby data processing tools such as pycall.rb and Charty. Since 2019, he has also been active as an Apache Arrow committer. From 2020, he served as a data science advisor at XICA, and in 2022, he joined XICA as CRO.

Executive Officer, Chief Data Science Officer: Tetsuya Haneda

He completed his graduate studies in Systems Innovation at Osaka University. After graduating, he joined Recruit Co., Ltd. as a data scientist, where he was involved in analyzing customer behavior across the entire group of companies. In 2022, he joined XICA as a lead data scientist, where he promoted research and development of advertising effectiveness estimation methods and data analysis in various domains. After serving as Chief Data Scientist, he assumed his current position in March 2026.

Executive Officer, Chief Technology Officer: Taichi Amano

He joined FICC Corporation as a software engineer and was involved in various system development projects. Subsequently, he served as a development team leader at Raksul Corporation, and as a lead engineer, SRE, and engineering manager at Speee Corporation. In 2020, he joined XICA and served as CTO Office Manager. In April 2022, he was appointed CTO.

Executive Officer, Chief Product Officer: Yohei Ikuchi

After working as a radio personality and indie bandmaster during his student days, he became an executive officer and art director at Annie Design Office, Inc., where he handles design, development, CI, and VI projects. In 2008, he founded Design Bank, Inc., leading the integrated authentication and on-campus equipment integrated management systems for medical and educational institutions. In 2012, he founded Socket, Inc., which he sold to KDDI Corporation after developing the web customer service system Flipdesk. He worked as an executive officer and CTO office at Supership, Inc. After leaving the company, he worked as an advisor in Japan and overseas for a year and a half, before becoming an executive officer and CTO at Makuake, Inc. He became a director, went public, and will retire in 1. This leads to him joining XICA.

About us

XICA is a data science firm that creates a growth spiral for businesses. Utilizing highly accurate data science, we help clients "elucidate market and customer mechanisms," "develop strategies," "strengthen organizational execution capabilities," and "build data infrastructure to accumulate knowledge," thereby realizing a growth spiral that allows them to "continue to win" in business. We support our clients' businesses with a highly applied team comprised of leading data scientists and researchers from Japan and overseas, as well as experienced personnel in various fields such as strategic consulting, organizational execution support, and technology implementation.

*XICA and the XICA name and logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of XICA Co., Ltd. in Japan and other countries.
*Other company names and product names mentioned are trademarks or registered trademarks of each company.

　

Inquiries regarding this press release

  • XICA Corporation Public Relations Officer: Kunimatsu
  • TEL：03-6380-9897
  • E-MAIL:pr@xica.net