Executive Research Fellow
Master (International Political Economy)
■Research Area
Digital Transformation, Data Platforms, Information Sociology, e-Government, Regional Informatization
The key to success in digital transformation (DX) is to promote DX in an open manner. For example, open DX for municipalities means “visualizing the current status of the municipality in real time, from the status of budget execution to the status of garbage collection, sharing administrative issues with citizens, and transforming the municipality into a citizen-participating government.” Open DX for corporations means “visualizing the current status of the corporation in real time, from the status of budget execution to the status of sales, sharing management issues with employees, and transforming the corporation into an employee-participating management.
The Barcelona Digital City Project is an example of a successful local government project. They have turned the old smart city approach of embedding sensors in the infrastructure around 180 degrees and are promoting DX by involving consumers. The key to this kind of open DX is data and data platforms. My research focuses on how to not only collect data, but also easily deliver the necessary data to the right people at the appropriate time.
Since 2012, Tomihiko Azuma has been working for the Open Knowledge Foundation Japan and Open Corporates Japan to promote open data. Currently, he is carrying out a cross-agency digital transformation promotion project to improve services for residents in Nakatsu City. He has written numerous articles for “Marketing DX Latest Strategy” (Nikkei BP) and “AI, IoT, and Data Application Overview” (Nikkei BP). He is the author of the recent book “People who work hard on ‘dataｘideas’” (“Data X Idea de Shoubusuru Hitobito”) (Nikkei BP, October 2014). He is also an advisor to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications on regional informatization and an open data evangelist for the Cabinet Secretariat.
1983 University of Electro-Communications, Faculty of Electro-Communications
2002 Completed Master’s program, Graduate School of International Political Science and Economics, Aoyama Gakuin University
1983 Joined NEC Corporation
2010 Senior Researcher, Institute for International Socio-Economic Studies, Japan (-2015)
2014 Managing Director, Open Corporate Japan, Inc.
2015 Retired from NEC Corporation
2015 President and Representative Director, Publica Corporation (-2016)
2017 Vice President, Big Data & Open Data Initiative Kyushu
2018 Director for BODIK, Kyushu Institute of Advanced Science and Technology
2021 Representative of DX Consulting “KIAZUMA”, Nakatsu City DX Promotion Supervisor
