Who we are

Equmenopolis helps people to learn, work, and enjoy themselves in the digitized society with socially-intelligent conversational AI technology. In the upcoming, increasingly-digitized society (dubbed society 5.0), Equmenopolis aims to contribute its innovation share by creating highly interactive conversational AI agents, capable of supporting and servicing all aspects of work and education.

A Cybernetic Planet-wide City where Humans and AI Evolve Together

Founded in May 2022 as a spin-out from an academic research group in Tokyo, Equmenopolis provides conversational AI agents in the newly digital society, where cyberspace and the physical world increasingly intertwine. As society 5.0 unfolds, digitalization will progress in all aspects of work and education. We have joined this movement by developing an all-purpose conversational AI agent platform, capable of automating many human-labor intensive tasks that burden productivity. We strive to originate a conversational AI service that will revolutionize the efficiency and quality of any business.

 

Company Name

The name Equmenopolis was derived from a hypothetical concept of a planet-wide city proposed by the Greek city planner Constantinos Doxiadis (1913 – 1975). The word ‘ecumenopolis’ served to represent the idea that urban areas and megapolises would one day fuse to form a single, continuous world-wide city (ecumene: world, polis:city). The concept was dreamt of long before the invention of the Internet – a utopian city-planet that possessed the characteristics of both a local and global community, where information and transportation networks flowed fast and all around. In many ways, ecumenopolis stood for an idea that was close to today’s “digital society” (Society 5.0)

Equmenopolis’ “EQ” stands for Emotional Intelligence Quotient (EQ), which is the ability to perceive and interpret one’s own emotions, as well as the emotions of others. “EQ” also includes the mathematical meaning of Ǝ (Existential Quantifier). 

On the whole, our name encapsulates the idea of a planet-wide city of human-AI coexistence, and the commercial ecosystem that is produced as a fruit of this relationship.

Founding Team

Yoichi Matsuyama, the CEO and founder of Equmenopolis, obtained his doctorate degree from Waseda University’s Graduate School of Science and Engineering. At Carnegie Mellon University, he led the research and development efforts for the official virtual assistant of the World Economic Forum (Davos), and oversaw other AI industry-academia collaboration projects including with Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!.  After returning to Japan in 2019, he was appointed as a senior researcher (associate professor) at the Perceptual Computing Laboratory at Waseda University. His other pivoting roles include serving as Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) where he leveraged his rich international, technology management consulting experience, as well as his position as Chief Operating Officer (COO) with expertise in R&D management in the field of AI and robotics.

Equmenopolis’ R&D members include researchers in spoken dialogue systems, natural language processing, machine learning, VR/AR, applied linguistics, architecture and art, more than half of whom are doctoral degree holders. Our team is built upon diverse backgrounds which include Japan, the US, France, Poland and Colombia, and we seek to continue recruiting world-class researchers and engineers in the upcoming future.

From the Waseda University’s Perceptual Computing Laboratory, our members include Hiroaki Takatsu (Dialogue Systems/Natural Language Processing), Mao Saeki (Dialogue Systems), Shungo Suzuki (Second Language Acquisition), Mineo Watanabe (Robotics), Ryota Ando (Service Design). Tetsunori Kobayashi (Professor, Faculty of Science and Engineering), director of the Perceptual Computing Laboratory serves as technical advisor to the project.

 

Company

Company nameEqumenopolis, Inc.
FoundationMay 2, 2022
LocationHeadquater: Entrepreneurship Center, Building 19-3, Waseda University, 1-22-3 Nishi-Waseda, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 169-0051, Japan
Research Center: Room 301, Green Computing Systems Research Center, Waseda University, 27 Waseda, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-0042, Japan
*Please send any mails to our Research Center
Executive OfficersCEO Yoichi Matsuyama
CSO/CFO Keita Miyamura
Business DomainDevelopment of conversational AI agent platform and its applications
Fundings・Beyond 5G Seed Program, Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications
・Seed-stage Technology-based Startups (STS), New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO)
・"Next generation AI evolving with humans", New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO)
・ Program for Creating Start-ups from Advanced Research and Technology (START), Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST)
・SBIR Phase 1, Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST)
・Fujitsu Laboratories Digital Annealer Collaborative Research
・Acceleration program "BRAVE" sponsored by Beyond Next Ventures
・Globis Accelerator Program "G-STARTUP"
・Sony Startup Acceleration Program (SSAP)
・Techstars Founder Catalyst program (Techstars & JETRO)
Cooperating organization・Green Computing Systems Research Organization, Waseda University
・Entrepreneurship Center, Waseda University
・Beyond Next Ventures K.K.
・Waseda University Ventures, Inc.
・Waseda University Academic Solutions Inc.
・Intelligent Framework Iaboratory, Inc.
・Naigai Cutting News Agency, Inc.
・Altbridge Technology Corporation
・Choitek LCC
・Yamazaki Kikaku Kenkyusho
・Levi Design
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