Yui Kawada

The Tenacity to Never Give Up Creates New Things

My main job is to purchase products from major US semiconductor manufacturers and provide them to Japanese medical device and consumer device manufacturers. It takes several years from the time we propose a product to a customer until the product equipped with that technology is distributed in the world. For this reason, we make proposals to our customers based on what the world will be like in the future.

The real pleasure of this job is to provide customers with cutting-edge products and contribute to the creation of new products that have not yet been released. Especially memorable is the case I experienced in the third year of joining the company. The customer I was in charge of at the time was developing a next-generation digital camera equipped with functions that no other manufacturer had been able to achieve, and the products I handled were used in that camera. It is. As soon as this next-generation digital camera was released, it became a hot topic in the market and became such a big hit that there was a long line of people lining up at electronics stores. When I actually witnessed the scene, I was able to enjoy a great sense of accomplishment. I was extremely proud to be in a position to provide new value to the world.

But winning this business was not easy. When I heard about the development plan for this camera, I immediately made a proposal to the customer. We need to add new features.” Adding new functions to semiconductors is not an easy task. You will have to negotiate with your US supplier manufacturer and have them use their vast engineering resources to make changes to the hardware itself.

Therefore, I started negotiations with the manufacturer with two things in mind. One is to clearly present the merits on the supplier manufacturer side of having them cooperate with the addition of this new function. Summarizing trends in the Japanese camera industry and demand forecasts for next-generation digital cameras, we appealed that responding to customer requests would lead to great profits for our suppliers. The second is to share the “excitement”. In order to promote the advanced nature of digital cameras developed by providing customers with products with new functions, we invited key personnel from the US headquarters of our supplier manufacturers to Japan and gave them a speech, Let's create something new together," he enthusiastically gave a presentation in cooperation with the customer.

As a result, negotiations with the supplier manufacturer were concluded, the new function was incorporated into the product, and the customer decided to adopt it. Through this project, I was able to learn that it is important to have the tenacity to not give up in order to contribute to the birth of new things that have not yet been released to the world. In addition, the sales of this project amounted to several hundred million yen, and we were able to make a significant contribution to the company in terms of numbers. Being able to experience this project, which has developed into a big business, in my third year with the company has given me confidence afterwards.

Question the Obvious and Create the Next Obvious

From my 7th year with the company, in addition to my sales work, I also took up marketing work. Sales used to visit customers and explain products using product catalogs, but now customers can collect information themselves on the Internet. For several years now, I have been thinking that it is necessary to break away from the existing sales style and establish a method that is in line with the times. I was. As a result, I was able to get a chance to build a new sales style from the standpoint of marketing.

Currently, we are focusing on creating content to provide and collect information digitally. By posting information that was originally available only in paper catalogs on our website, and creating videos of examples of customers adopting our products and using them at exhibitions, etc., we are able to provide information to customers. We are striving for efficiency.

As a result of our steady efforts, thousands of customers came to see our digital content this year alone, and we are proud that we were able to produce great results. In addition to preparing a place to provide such digital information, we also created a system that can collect information on customers who have accessed product information. Until now, sales had collected customer information using their own feet, but we were able to achieve our goals many times more efficiently.

There are many things I know because I have experience in sales, such as what kinds of attempts will help sales activities, and what kind of information and methods will be beneficial to customers. I will continue to use my experience to contribute to the team as much as possible.

Proud Culture is Open Flat Fair

What I love about Macnica 's company culture is that it is open, flat, and fair. Before I joined the company, I had heard that Macnica 's interpersonal relationships are open and flat, but after joining the company, I found that the company culture was much more than I had imagined, allowing me to say what I really wanted to say to my superiors and seniors. If you can clearly state your opinion in response to your boss's opinion, saying, ``That's wrong,'' and if your opinion is logically correct, your boss will say, ``Thank you,'' and accept your opinion. I have exchanged different opinions with my boss many times, but I have never received a single negative look. In fact, they are happy to express their thoughts about what they want to do.