Abstracts of Magazine FUJITSU 2013-1 (VOL. 64, NO. 1)

Special Issue: Toward the New World by Using ICT

• Fujitsu's Approach to Expanding Fields of ICT Application

Conventionally, information and communications technology (ICT) has been mainly used to reduce the amount of work that people need to do, improve operational efficiency and reduce costs. Recently, however, expectations for new ways to utilize ICT have arisen. In the background of this phenomenon are changes in the business environment. Diversification of consumer needs and uncertain economic trends, combined with intensified market competition, are making it extremely difficult to create new businesses. Under these circumstances, an increasing number of customers are seeking advice about fields in which ICT has not been applied or in which it was thought impossible to utilize ICT. In the process of seeking the ideal future society while addressing the issues described above, we have focused on the actual data generated by people's activities and movements of objects in the real world and have worked to create new value with such data. We aim to realize a society in which people can live more affluently and safely by taking advantage of Fujitsu's comprehensive technical ability to analyze, integrate and utilize this massive amount of various types of data. This paper describes how to utilize data, mainly big data, which have been attracting attention recently, to expand the fields to which ICT can make contributions. It also presents Fujitsu's comprehensive ability, expectations from society, application of ICT to new fields, and the future direction in which we should head.

• Data Curation Service to Support Value Creation from Big Data

Strategic and prompt utilization of massive amounts of various types of big data is expected to create significant value in the industrial world. However, utilizing big data often requires advanced analysis skills and a large-scale analysis environment and there is also the issue of a difficulty in verifying cost-effectiveness. These problems have made many enterprises reluctant to embark on specific approaches for using big data. Fujitsu's Data Curation is a set of analysis services that supports customers faced with these problems. Data curators, who are experts in big data analysis, promptly and accurately verify the value of big data for customers' management and operations. Data curators freely use their expertise in data analysis and carry out analysis that maximizes the potential value of big data in a large-scale analysis environment. This "make data speak" approach allows new information to be discovered in a way that is not influenced by a person's knowledge of the categories of business or operations. It also allows people to have an objective and accurate understanding of the usefulness and effectiveness of big data. Of the Data Curation Services, which have produced satisfactory results in wide-ranging categories of business and operations, this paper presents an in-house case example concerning the prevention of lifestyle-related diseases.

• Development of New Data-oriented Services

Only a limited number of enterprises actually utilize and analyze big data and most enterprises have not embarked on specific approaches to doing so, although they are interested in data utilization. The value of data is increased further as the states of more and more things in the real world are captured, aggregated and integrated, and the value of data is estimated to increase as more enterprises work on doing this. That is, the increase in the number of enterprises that start utilizing data can be said to directly lead to an expansion of the big data business. To encourage enterprises to utilize data, Fujitsu has commercialized services that implement two data utilization models: "data reutilization service" and "cross-segment mashup service." The former adds new interpretations to data to find new values so that the data can be used as the basis for new services, and the latter makes use of data obtained from services of different industries to mutually enhance services and create new ones. This paper presents these two services together with their examples and gives a description about "data marketplace," a place for data exchange that promotes reutilization of data collected in services.

• Platform Services for Data Utilization

Fujitsu offers Platform Services for Data Utilization in the form of PaaS running on a public cloud. These services have functions for collecting and accumulating massive amounts of data via the Internet, for immediately detecting data out of the collected massive data that match specific conditions, and for analyzing the massive amounts of data. Conventionally, customers themselves prepared the hardware and software required for constructing a data utilization system. By using these services, however, they can build a series of processes from the collection and accumulation through to detection and analysis of big data in a short time and readily start operation without needing to have their own assets. Linking with external applications is also possible, and this allows Platform Services for Data Utilization to connect with customers' on-premises and cloud environments and incorporate the processes that efficiently use massive amounts of data. This paper presents the functions, features and conceptual images of use of the Platform Services for Data Utilization.

• New Services Using Location Information Platform

Recently, the advance of ICT has meant that a greater range of devices can be connected to networks and it has made them widespread in our daily life. Information on the situations of people, society and the environment can be obtained from these network-connectable devices in real time. Fujitsu thinks that obtaining and making use of massive amounts of various types of data from these different devices will help realize a more affluent and secure society. Accordingly, we are offering SPATIOWL, a system that has made it possible to integrate and handle massive amounts of various types of information, mainly location information, for the purpose of realizing an affluent society. It does this by gathering, accumulating and analyzing massive amounts of sensing data and combines wisdom to resolve wide-ranging issues from corporate to global ones. This paper presents examples of utilizing the location information platform, which is one service provided by SPATIOWL, and explains its features and forms of use.

• Application Platform for Location-Based Services

With the "realization of a Human-Centric Intelligent Society" as its vision, Fujitsu aims to make people's lives more affluent and comfortable. To achieve this aim, it is essential to sense various types of data that exist in the real world and accurately grasp what events are occurring. All humans and objects always have "location" information and the values for those locations change as they move. That is, reliably grasping these targets and their location information is one means of gaining a more accurate understanding of the events occurring in the real world, and we believe this will bring great value. Meanwhile, as smartphones and mobile networks have become widespread and enhanced, the environment for handling location information has improved. Location information is becoming an important information asset for corporate activities, and management of such location information for use in improving operations and creating services is now beginning to directly lead to enhanced corporate value. Fujitsu offers SPATIOWL, a set of cloud services that make use of location information. Of the SPATIOWL services, this paper presents the Platform Service for Location Information that customers can use to independently develop applications and systems, and it describes the features and forms of use of this service, and future schemes.

• Airplane Maintenance Optimization with Fujitsu's Global RFID Solution

In February 2012, the U.S. company Boeing launched a set of services intended for airlines around the world called the RFID Integrated Solutions to improve the efficiency of aircraft maintenance by making use of radio-frequency identification (RFID). Fujitsu provides Boeing with Fujitsu's Automated Identification Technology (AIT) Solution as a globally-shared IT platform for the service. With this solution, AIT devices are attached to aircraft components, accessories and equipment to automatically collect data in the maintenance process, and enables proper management of parts status and inventory, leading to efficient operation ofaircraft parts. In addition, the AIT Solution takes advantage of Fujitsu's unique strengths, such as its development of a passive RFID chip with the world's highest-capacity memory and special tag for aviation use, software development capability to provide an entire system in one-stop, and global support coverage. This paper outlines the AIT solution and describes its application.

• Elderly Care Cloud Series —Services Making Use of Information Linkage Platform

While the total population of Japan is decreasing after it peaked at 128.06 million in 2010, the rate of population aging is increasing, with the elderly population accounting for a larger percentage every year. Of all households including one or more person aged 65 years or older, in particular, households with one elderly person or elderly couple alone accounted for 42.6% in 2010. One of the issues with an upcoming aged society is the limits of the existing administrative services. Meanwhile, more and more elderly people are feeling insecure about their social isolation, health and daily life as aging is progressing rapidly. To address these anxieties felt by the elderly, we have constructed an information linkage platform. We considered it important to build a platform for comprehensively supporting the elderly in terms of both health and living by means of seamless information linkage that connects the people concerned who assist the elderly (the spouse, family, local community and people such as health support service providers including team care members and living support service providers). We systematized the Elderly Care Cloud series of services which are ones that make use of the information linkage platform. This paper presents Fujitsu's approach to solving the above-mentioned issues by using the Elderly Care Cloud series based on the information linkage platform.

• Advanced Analytics of Big Data for Convergence Services

This paper introduces technology for analyzing a large amount of data so as to realize convergence services. Convergence services extract new business value from various types of data that represent the behavior of societies and individual persons. We need to analyze a large amount of data such as social media including blogs, twitter, SNS, and data from various types of sensors such as those in cell phones and automobiles, and environmental sensors. These types of data are very different from business data that traditional analytic technologies deal with in business intelligence applications. In this paper, we show three new analytic technologies for such data: fast and flexible stream data processing technology, large-network data analysis, and optimization with a binary decision diagram.

• Skin Check Technology Using Smartphones

Conventionally, for people to have their skin condition checked they had to visit a branch of a cosmetics manufacturer or such like, and a specialist then used a dedicated machine to check their skin. Meanwhile, with the rapid improvement in performance of smartphone cameras, there is now a possibility that people can use such cameras to easily check their skin condition at home. However, there is a problem with this because the result of measuring people's skin color might be different from the actual color for reasons such as the lighting they have at home. We have developed technology called Color Frame that allows people to take a photograph of their skin with a smartphone camera and accurately check their skin condition. In addition, use of imaging technologies such as filtering allows them to measure the amount of skin spots or pores they have. In this way, users can easily check their skin condition at home without having to visit store fronts. This paper mainly describes the technology for automatic color correction by using Color Frame, out-of-focus detection technology to ensure the quality of images taken with a smartphone, and image processing technology for detecting spots and pores.

• Technology to Manage Indoor Locations

Smart devices and wireless networks have become widespread and an environment is gradually being put in place in which information can be accessed "anytime, anywhere and by anybody." However, this situation is also causing massive floods of information far beyond the processing capacity of humans. Conversely, this means fairly heavy burdens are imposed on users. What is called for in the future is not a system that humans must adapt to, but a human-centric ICT system that adapts itself to humans. To realize such a system, we have focused on the fact that people's roles change according to their location and time, and are working on research and development of a location-aware service platform that offers the services and information needed at a given time. The point in this concept is to find out the location of people and tailor services accordingly. While positioning by the GPS is the mainstream for outdoor locations, no similar versatile positioning technology has been established for indoor ones. To address this issue, we have developed a technology to manage locations including indoor positioning by making use of general-purpose devices such as smart devices. This paper first explains the aim of the research and development and gives an overall picture of the location-aware service platform. Then, as its key technology, it presents our approach to developing technology to manage indoor locations based on field testing.

• Sensing Technology Supporting Convergence Service

As an activity in the field of intelligent transport system (ITS), Fujitsu has so far been developing sensing technologies to help ensure road traffic safety. Those technologies help people drive safely by sensing the surrounding vehicles and obstacles (outside) as well as the state of the driver and the vehicle itself (inside) to detect various dangerous conditions based on the data obtained. Up to now, these technologies have been applied to independent safety information provision systems for the respective vehicles. However, the recent development of ICT is making it possible for individual vehicles to "connect" to a cloud system with their own sensing data. This allows moving vehicles to function as sensors at the forefront of traffic conditions and massive data sets to be gathered in the cloud system. That is, an advanced telematics service can be realized in which various types of gathered data obtained from many vehicles are analyzed to give valuable feedback to vehicles and drivers. This paper presents Fujitsu's variety of vehicle sensing technologies and convergence services that make use of sensing data.

• Area 1seg Broadcasting Advancing from Field Tests to Institutionalization

Area 1seg broadcasting, which is a system of independent 1seg broadcasting within a confined area of about a few hundred meters, was institutionalized in April 2012. This system allows anybody to obtain a broadcasting license for a small area and provide independent broadcasting services. It has already been used as a new medium in stadiums, event venues, shopping streets and universities and is expected to develop in the future. Since before the institutionalization of area broadcasting, Fujitsu has been conducting many field tests on area 1seg by using experimental licenses. We have cooperated with partners such as universities and delivered event and regional information to accumulate experience in terms of both technologies and services. After the institutionalization, we have taken advantage of this experience and transitioned to full licenses and proxy applications for licenses. This paper describes the present state in relation to the institutionalization, tests conducted in specific white space districts and such like, example of an application for a full license, issues and solutions, knowledge acquired and future activities.

• Road to Applying ICT to Agriculture

Fujitsu has launched the "innovation support service," a consultation service for agricultural producers that makes proposals including innovation of work styles concerning how information and communications technology (ICT) can be utilized to overcome management challenges. This service is based on site improvement, introduction of a plan–do–check–act (PDCA) cycle and assistance with data utilization through ICT, and is composed of the preparation, execution and management support phases. We believe that, if agricultural producers seriously work on these activities through the respective phases, they will be able to not only introduce ICT and utilize data but also feel ICT is more accessible to them. In addition, it has been found that an organizational climate that suits ICT utilization can be cultivated, resulting in positive effects on the development of human resources. Integrating services by people and by ICT to mutually enhance their value is the essence of the innovation support service. This paper presents Fujitsu's innovation support service by describing the background to its establishment, its purpose, and field test examples and effects.

• Demonstration of Improvement in Efficiency of Agricultural Insurance Operations by Use of Observation Satellite Data

Agriculture is dependent on the weather. When crops are damaged due to typhoons or torrential downpours, insurance money is paid to farmers according to factors like the area being cultivated and type of crop planted, based on an agricultural insurance scheme. In agricultural insurance operations, newly added farmland and crop rotations must be quickly identified every year based on crop change reports submitted by member farms. At present, a vast number of rice paddies (parcel maps of rice paddies) have to be manually updated, and this is very troublesome. We thought that replacing this manual work with information and communications technology (ICT) that makes use of image analysis technology would increase the efficiency of agricultural insurance operations, reduce the time and cost required, and improve the accuracy. This technology involves inputting satellite and aerial images into a system, detecting paddy embankments by image analysis, and outputting the contours of embankments as vector data. We have conducted field testing to see if the technology can be used to effectively update parcel maps of rice paddies. This paper presents the result of verifying the methodology to improve insurance operations by means of a field test. The test, which is in the intermediate phase, has shown that parcel maps of rice paddies can be created with an accuracy of 90% or higher. This is a sufficient level for practical use and raises expectations for significant improvement in the efficiency of operations.

• New Form of ICT with Focus on User Data

It has become common for individuals to use many mobile devices as smartphones and tablets flourish, and synchronizing data between such devices is growing to be a matter of concern. Meanwhile, the dissemination of many excellent cloud services has meant that our user data are scattered in various services and mobile devices. These two trends are apparently accelerating and showing no signs of stopping. In the present-day ICT environment where numerous mobile devices and services continue to evolve on a daily basis through innovation, many ICT users are using them while exercising their ingenuity to make gradual modifications to the way the devices and services are used. As a result, it has become difficult to manage and grasp how much of their own user data exist in which devices and services. To solve this problem, Fujitsu has devised and implemented a model called "user data container," which is a new form of cloud with the focus on user data, and used it to conduct multiple demonstration experiments, producing substantial results. This paper outlines the design concept and specifications of the persona container, the results of the demonstration tests that used it, and the future prospects.