fiBona

Shiseido Research Center's open innovation program "fibona" started for collaboration with startup companies

Shiseido will begin collaborating with startup companies as part of the "fibona" open innovation program led by the Shiseido Global Innovation Center (GIC), a new research and development base. fibona consists of four activity plans and is a program for co-creation with external parties with the aim of creating new value in the beauty field and generating innovation that goes beyond cosmetics alone.
In July, we recruited participating companies for one of our activities, "Co-creation with Startups.” After an internal screening process, we decided to work with three companies toward co-creation. We will continue to consider the fusion of innovative and unique ideas from startup companies and R&D in our existing business, as well as the creation of value in new areas that have never been explored before, such as business development.

Background of the Program
The GIC building began operations in April 2019 as an urban open laboratory. The open space on the lower floors is the center of interaction between consumers and researchers, for collaboration with external research institutions in Japan and abroad, and for the creation of various ways for researchers to work.
Through fibona, Shiseido will create new values that excite the world by combining unique ideas and technologies from outside the company with Shiseido's knowledge of beauty and science.
We will continue to realize our corporate mission "BEAUTY INNOVATIONS FOR A BETTER WORLD" through a wide variety of innovations.

fibona's four activity plans

1. Co-creation with Startups
This is an acceleration program aimed at co-creation with startup companies mainly in the beauty tech industry, and this year's theme was "Beauty Wellness." The program will now move forward with joint research, business development, and other concrete considerations.

2. Co-creation with Consumers
By utilizing GIC facilities and content such as the S/PARK Studio, researchers and consumers can directly communicate with each other about product experiences and post-use feedback to develop products and solutions from the consumers' perspective.

3. Speedy trial
In order to introduce the beta versions of the technology created by our research to the market with greater speed, we will utilize crowdfunding services and actively participate on beta launch platforms.

4. Cultivation
This is the creation of a base that stimulates the enthusiasm and ideas of researchers to create innovation by integrating diverse knowledge and people related to beauty, such as meetups (exchange meetings) between Shiseido researchers and people from different industries related to the beauty field.

List of collaborating companies selected for this project
DiGITAL ARTISAN, Inc.
https://www.extbold.com/english-onepage

no new folk studio Inc.
https://orphe.io/en

YUKASHIKADO Inc.
https://www.yukashikado.co.jp/

Click here to see the press release.
https://corp.shiseido.com/en/news/detail.html?n=00000000002739