Collaboration between mobility researchers and designers
Ito: As an undergraduate, I majored in mechanical engineering and researched robotics and micromachine control. During graduate school, I worked on circuits and other hardware and software to control micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS).
Driven by an interest in automotive electronic control systems, I also explored job opportunities at automakers and parts suppliers. However, I was drawn to Hitachi because of its diverse business sectors and its ability to encourage collaboration among experts in different fields. Therefore, I decided to join Hitachi rather than a company specializing in automobiles because I was attracted by the variety of opportunities. After joining Hitachi’s R&D organization, I was impressed by its internal expertise, which was both deep and broad. Thanks to this expertise, I was able to pursue new ideas with the support of specialists.
I started my career in electronic control systems for vehicle braking, steering, and overall motion control. Over time, my scope expanded to include the entire mobility system. Recently, I have been developing a mobility traffic control infrastructure platform designed to ensure high safety and operational efficiency in real-world environments. Our goal is to integrate drones and other emerging mobility technologies into this infrastructure.
Okuno: I majored in informatics and studied user-oriented information systems, including multilingual robots—things that fall within the area of services computing. My research included building systems that employ an application programming interface (API) to coordinate multilingual support using specialized terminology for tourist attractions and other purposes. Services computing is an area that overlaps with a broad range of interests, so Hitachi was ideal for me because of the wide range of businesses that it can combine.
Since joining the company, I have been researching design in the areas of business creation and business feasibility assessment. Compared to when I was studying services computing design through programming and systems development, my skillset has changed considerably. I feel that I am more like a consultant now. I started with programming, then progressed to a position of designing the business structure itself, and now research business design and service design. Launching a new business involves designing commercialization methods, such as how to create a good business, how to innovate, and how to scale—and that is what I do.
Mobility traffic control infrastructure: Enhancing safety and efficiency across diverse mobility modes
Ito: Our mobility traffic control infrastructure integrates technologies developed by several research teams. I have been involved in the project from the beginning, and I now manage all our research. Initially, we determined what technologies would be necessary by backcasting from our vision of the mobility sector in 2050. We projected that future society would exist alongside a wide variety of mobility devices—with air mobility in addition to ground mobility—and anticipated the need for systems that would link those modes and coordinate operations accordingly. We thus began developing elemental technologies targeting air mobility, which we expected to be in greater use and higher demand in the future. This was around 2021, but we already had an eye on Expo 2025.
We discussed what we should exhibit at the upcoming Expo and how to promote technologies that have yet to see the light of day in the real world. We also asked the Design Center, where Okuno works, to help us think of a way to involve others outside Hitachi and create guidelines for real-world implementations, both during the Expo and afterward.
In the end, we decided to prioritize building partnerships and getting visitors’ opinions on forming future cities.
Okuno: Aiming to create a future-oriented exhibit for Expo 2025, the Design Center focused on presenting how future cities will change as drones, flying cars, and other forms of airborne mobility become a part of society. Ito’s team handled the technological development, and we on the design side put together information on real-world implementation, touching on processes, locations, economic environments, and so on.
Mobility traffic control infrastructure improves traffic safety on the road and in the sky
Ito: From a technical standpoint, mobility traffic control infrastructure is a type of traffic control system. The aim of the research is to ensure the safety of mobility traffic, including air traffic. I believe that utilizing control systems to maintain safety, convenience, and efficiency is essential. This belief stems from my initial experience at Hitachi, where I researched automobile braking systems and learned the importance of safe operations. Mobility traffic control infrastructure extends to drones and other air mobility systems, improving safety by monitoring multiple mobility systems and their surroundings and coordinating operations in real time. I also believe that more efficient air transportation will allow people to feel comfortable using air mobility–based services in their day-to-day lives without thinking consciously about the safety of the given system.
What makes our mobility traffic control infrastructure possible is its cyber-physical system (CPS) architecture. Information is collected from real space, and the data is reconstructed, integrated, and stored as environmental factor data in the 4D information platform that we have developed. The 4D information platform, which adds time to spatial location information, includes obstacle information obtained via sensors and other means, weather and wind conditions, radio wave information, and third-party environmental information. Even with this vast amount of information, though, there are gaps in the temporal and spatial data gathered; predictions based on machine learning and other artificial intelligence (AI) technologies will be used as supplementary resources.
One element of the research is creating information. We are looking at how information should be created, stored, and provided to the control system. Environmental factor data is used to predict when and where risks will be present, and CPS simulations are used to formulate plans and coordinate things so that large numbers of drones can operate efficiently while avoiding risks. We are now working on how to apply route changes and other operational adjustments to the aircraft itself, including the interface between our mobility traffic control infrastructure and the aircraft and the user interface for operational management. Since some of these elements were beyond what Hitachi can do on its own, we teamed with partner companies to develop and build the system.
The system calculates safe routes in digital space and provides the results as profiles so that drones and other mobility devices can travel safely in the real sky (physical space). The idea is to ensure safety by creating a virtual road, like a highway in the sky, in an area that CPS simulations determine to be low-risk. The system leverages Hitachi’s technical strengths, such as technology to fill in missing information using AI and other means, together with technology to collect environmental information for risk prediction.
Searching for co-creation partners at Expo 2025
Okuno: Since Expo 2020 Dubai, World Expos have become platforms for companies to showcase new products. Many exhibits lay out the technologies and products that the exhibitors have developed and help the exhibitors find buyers. By demonstrating the kind of technology that we have, we hope the Hitachi exhibit will show visitors and potential partners that we want to share our desire to change society and cities with them and create business together.
The theme of the current Expo is “Designing Future Society for Our Lives.” As a partner in the Future City pavilion, Hitachi is jointly exhibiting with KDDI under the theme of “Society 5.0 and Future City,” which depicts the future in the year 2035. While the development of drones and flying cars promises a variety of benefits, there are also concerns about things like safety considerations. It would be quite a challenge to learn and understand everything on the spot, so we tailored the exhibit to present a handful of technological futures that visitors can choose from, making it a fun, interactive experience. We want to welcome visitors to become citizens of the Future City, so to speak, and have fun discussing the future of society.
Ito: If the exhibit were left solely to the research team, it might have been entirely research-oriented and failed to demonstrate how the technology would be applied in real-world scenarios. By involving designers like Okuno in the process and carefully considering how to communicate ideas, we believe we can clearly present innovations enabled by technology to visitors. We anticipate this will generate both positive and negative reactions, as well as valuable feedback. Then, our goal is to create opportunities for co-creation between Hitachi and companies that have experienced this process..
Okuno: One aspect of the story we present is the transformation of society through the use of drones. But Hitachi, working by itself, cannot just go and build a drone delivery business, for example. The drone aircraft itself would be built by another company, and we would rely on cooperation with partners for real-world logistics and so on. If we can expand Hitachi’s business through partnerships that come together at Expo 2025, that would be fantastic.
Realizing “virtual roads in the sky”
Okuno: We have created a roadmap for air mobility through 2030 as part of our efforts to achieve real-world implementation of our mobility traffic control infrastructure. In addition to depicting how consumers, society, and social issues might change over time, the roadmap shows the relevant solutions and technologies that Hitachi provides or has in development. For example, the roadmap lays out a service with a social need: a drone-based medicine-delivery service for mountainous areas and remote islands. We speculated that drone delivery would offer immediate benefits for pharmaceuticals and other items that have high unit-delivery costs and need to be delivered quickly.
(Prepared with reference to “Prime Minister’s Office: Roadmap for the Industrial Revolution in the Sky 2024 (Nov. 2024)”)
To provide some background, Japan has a shortage of public medical facilities and physicians. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, home healthcare and telemedicine have become more and more common. In that context, there are needs for solutions that make it possible to deliver medicine to mountainous areas and remote islands. For consumers, the change we create will deepen their understanding of convenience and promote a better understanding of environmental value and safety. Given the limited access to public medical facilities and the current shortage of delivery drivers, we also want to work toward a public consensus on implementing drone delivery. Hitachi will start with demonstration experiments and then combine CPS and other technologies to provide our mobility traffic control infrastructure while taking its features to the next level.
The roadmap allows us to visualize the way that these changes and challenges in society will require not only drone support but also new mechanisms within healthcare and logistics. We want to drive home the relationship between what Hitachi is capable of and what we want to achieve, along with the connections between technology and society, to highlight the vast areas where Hitachi cannot do it alone. Hitachi needs others to manufacture the drones, to prescribe the medicine, and to provide communications, energy, and other services.
We would like to sow the seeds of co-creation by asking a simple question: “Hitachi wants to do this—how can you help?” Drone-based medicine delivery is just one example, and the exhibit explores other applications. We want to create opportunities for co-creation in a wide range of areas.
Co-creation born at Expo 2025
Okuno: Our exhibit at Expo 2025 invites all visitors, young and old, to choose what their “Future City” will be like and then create it. They are presented with two questions and asked to select their vision of the Future City, so each session creates a different city. We are aiming to communicate Hitachi’s hopes for the Future City both to potential corporate partners and to the general public.
Our idea is to invite companies that have experienced the Expo exhibit to visit our Research & Development site to learn more about specific drone applications and other topics. Together with detailed technical explanations, we also give companies firsthand insights through demonstrations that show possible scenarios where the technology can make an impact. From there, we can work together to determine the value we can provide to people and the direction of our collaboration. The Expo is the first point of contact, and the Research & Development site is the second forum for discussion.
We have already had more opportunities to discuss external collaboration since the start of the Expo. What I sense is that there are more companies and organizations out there sincerely thinking about the future than we might have thought. It’s a reminder that society is much larger than we imagine. That is why we must continue to discuss these issues. Of course, we are a business, and profits are obviously something we need to think about. But I feel that, instead of making profits our main focus, we also need to create mechanisms to channel the money we earn back to society as an engine for improvement.
Ito: Integrating new technology into the real world poses significant challenges. We must not only develop entirely new technologies but also ensure their economic viability. At the same time, social infrastructure is a key component of Hitachi's business portfolio. Therefore, building infrastructure for the implementation and continuous operation of drones and other mobility solutions is an important challenge for us. Hitachi cannot achieve this alone; no company can. I believe Hitachi can contribute to defining and implementing requirements that benefit society. As a social infrastructure–oriented company, it is our responsibility to be proactive.
Okuno: The fact that so much of Hitachi’s business is B2B is exactly why the end-user experience is something that we need to put a stronger emphasis on; that perspective is so important. We want to talk to other companies and organizations, but also with consumers, to build an approach that leads to win-win outcomes. I hope you all come to visit Expo 2025 and stop by the Future City pavilion in the Future Life Zone near the West Gate. It’s a lot of fun!
Takahiro ITO
Future Society Project Member and Chief Researcher
Autonomous Control Research Department
Mobility ＆ Automation Innovation Center
Digital Innovation R&D
Research & Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd.
Learning co-creation from a Chinese classic
I am a fan of classical Chinese literature, particularly Sangokushi (The Three Kingdoms, Eiji Yoshikawa, Kodansha Ltd.; a Japanese retelling of the original story), which I bought and read in high school. Today, we live in a “VUCA” era—an age of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity—much like the unpredictable times depicted in Sangokushi. The characters come together with their various ideas and, in the end, a country takes shape. I find this process very similar to co-creation in the modern world. In my high school days, I admired the heroics, but reading it now, I feel there is something to learn from the way different groups come together or fall apart. The story also offers valuable lessons in management strategy. Each time I revisit it, I gain new insights. My favorite is still the fifth book, which describes the leadup to the famous battle of Red Cliff and its aftermath.
Ryosuke OKUNO
Future Society Project Member and Researcher
Strategic Design Department
Design Center
Digital Innovation R&D
Research & Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd.
Plotting a course to the future with a digital roadmap
The book I want to mention is Maho no seiki (Magical Century, Yoichi Ochiai, PLANETS). It originally came out in 2015, but I think it is still ahead of the times. It is about how society and lifestyles will change in the future based on digital nature—Ochiai’s own view of nature from the perspective of computer science. It also features a roadmap toward the ultimate destination for digital life, which I feel is highly relevant to Hitachi’s infrastructure business. This may be an old book from the author’s point of view, but it was one that struck a chord with me. I also recommend null2 , Yoichi Ochiai’s signature pavilion at Expo 2025.
