Interview with Become Japan CEO Masahiro Ueno
I recently had the opportunity to interview Become Japan's new CEO, Masahiro Ueno. I became interested in him after learning of his work in developing the Japanese market offering of Overture and his presidency at DoubleClick Japan.

I focus first on "business translation" questions, as this is what most interested me about his work - how one takes an American developed offering and ports it over to another country and culture's market space.

Further on we get into social shopping and what Become Japan has planned there.

Their release:
Internet Luminary Masahiro Ueno joins Become Japan as CEO

Here are my key take aways from our interview, in Mr. Ueno's words:

The Japanese mostly rely on directory services rather than product research and comparison shopping. We see the opportunity to convert users to a more robust shopping experience by using a site like Become Japan. We are also looking at extending our product to mobile services when we roll-out the comparison shopping service in early 2007.

At Become Japan, we invested months in refining Become’s search technology to handle Japanese language queries with precision results. This is an investment that many others in the comparison shopping space have not been willing to make and will be a tremendous advantage for us as we begin our marketing outreach later this year.

Personalization, or group consensus features like Yahoo 360 are services that Become will look into. User referrals like blogs and user and merchant reviews from multiple sources are also increasingly popular in Japan. As we develop our technology, we will look to include user ratings that are aggregated from multiple sources.

You can’t just slap a logo on a company and expect it to work in another country. We are investing in building the Become Japan business for the long term because there is a big market opportunity.

In Become’s case, we have to understand the ecommerce market – size, types of products selling in Japan. For example, Electronics items as well as cosmetics, and gourmet products such as wines sell well in Japan.

Also, in Japan mobile devices are an important part of the e-commerce equation particularly with the younger generation of consumers.

There aren’t any significant leaders in this area currently.

The current Japanese ecommerce market totals approximately $60B. Mobile ecommerce in Japan makes up 15% of that market and is growing. Clearly this is a strong opportunity for Become Japan when it launches its mobile services.

Without further ado I give you Masahiro Ueno, CEO of Become Japan.

What in your professional background and personality makes you optimal for migrating Become to the Japanese marketplace?
My senior executive and marketing experiences at leading Internet companies like Overture Japan, Doubleclick and Recruit have given me a deep understanding of the advertising and commercial markets in Japan. I’ve been both an entrepreneur as well as led the operations at large publicly-traded media companies.

Become.com is great opportunity to apply all that I have learned to building the best and largest comparison shopping and product search company in Japan. There aren’t any significant leaders in this area currently. The strong technology behind Become.com as well as the U.S. and Japan executive teams will help us to achieve success.

You have successfully migrated both DoubleClick's and Overture's offerings into the Japanese marketplace. Please discuss or outline the migration process for each company.
Any kind of service or business must start with understanding the market, and in this case the Japanese market. In Become’s case, we have to understand the ecommerce market – size, types of products selling in Japan. For example, Electronics items as well as cosmetics, and gourmet products such as wines sell well in Japan.

Also, in Japan mobile devices are an important part of the e-commerce equation particularly with the younger generation of consumers. We also need to build partnerships and capture opportunities with other sites. Understanding the distribution market in Japan is critical in gaining access to major merchants and goods providers. For example, distributors are BIC camera and Yodibashi both have online and offline stores.

The current executive team at Become Japan will help me reach out to business partners and merchants, as well as hire more talent as we continue to grow.

What do you project will be the similarities and differences between the DoubleClick and Overture process to building Become Japan’s business?
In all of these businesses, we need to customize and develop products and services to match Japanese customer’s demands and accepted business practices.

In terms of differences, DoubleClick was a joint venture among several Japanese and US investors. Overture is a 100% USA owned company. Become Japan is a joint venture between Become.com and transcosmos Inc, a very strong Japanese IT company with deep understanding and investment in Internet companies

What did you have to add to each company's offerings to make them compelling to the Japanese marketplace?
At DoubleClick, we emphasized enterprise software vs. an ASP platform to suit Japanese customer demands. We also set up channel sales vs. direct sales to match market distribution practices.

At Overture, we launched a mobile search market platform. First full scale launch globally. Set up Ad agency sales channel to match market practices.

At Become Japan, we invested months in refining Become’s search technology to handle Japanese language queries with precision results. This is an investment that many others in the comparison shopping space have not been willing to make and will be a tremendous advantage for us as we begin our marketing outreach later this year.

How have you prepared for the Become.com to Become Japan migration?
Become Japan has successfully hired excellent talent to build the technology product for Japanese services. As noted earlier, Become also invested deeply in our technology conversion to the Japanese language to ensure high quality relevance of search results.

Language localization is a difficult technical problem, but this is an area in which Yeogirl Yun, CTO of Become.com, and other engineers in our company have deep expertise. You can’t just slap a logo on a company and expect it to work in another country. We are investing in building the Become Japan business for the long term because there is a big market opportunity.

There are few companies that are considered competitors with a company like Become. No other company in Japan offers the same quality search service that Become does.

Who have you spoken with the most from Become, what have you had to learn about from them?
I’ve spent a great deal of time with Michael Yang, the US CEO; Yeogirl Yun, the US CTO; Shin Nagakura, EVP at transcosmos. This week, the executives and I have been at Become.com’s offices in Silicon Valley for an intensive briefing on the company technology, business and direction. Everything I’ve learned has shown me that this will be a powerful consumer service in Japan as well.

Discuss the Japanese comparison shopping space - who are the innovators? Who will be your strongest competition? How will Become.co.jp differentiate?
Kakaku.com, EC Navi, Hikaku.com are a few of the closest competitors but nothing is quite like Become Japan. Our technology-based service will enable Become Japan to provide relevant research information, and fresh product information.

Yahoo Japan has the largest auction and portal but Become is the only shopping search site that offers relevant product search.

What is Become’s business model (are those affiliate ads or ppc?) and how will you have to adjust it to fit the Japanese webspace?
Become’s US business model is based on cost per clicks. Become Japan will use this same model for the Japanese market.

While initially we will have only sponsored ads with our search results, Become Japan’s comparison shopping will launch in early 2007, giving us an additional revenue stream.

What has been the biggest challenge thus far?
Our biggest challenge is creating a recognized consumer brand that will be supported by powerful technology & product. We are planning to kick off marketing activities this Fall.

Hiring talent is also challenging because the job market in Japan has picked up because the economy has returned and improved.

What will be the biggest changes you have to make to Become to make it suitable for the Japanese webspace?
As stated earlier, we have taken big steps to make sure that the technology is able to search for and provide the most relevant product results. With that, we are adapting the user interface (UI) to match Japanese users taste and behavior. The Japanese mostly rely on directory services rather than product research and comparison shopping. We see the opportunity to convert users to a more robust shopping experience by using a site like Become Japan. We are also looking at extending our product to mobile services when we roll-out the comparison shopping service in early 2007.

Discussion forums are a fantastic addition to Become.com’s SERPs. I assume there are forums in the Japanese webspace, but are there other forms of online community publishing that you will draw from for product reviews?
Discussion forums and ranked message boards are well perceived in Japanese webspace.

What are your thoughts on making Become.co.jp more open to user input - in giving the users themselves more of a voice in the results pages?
Personalization, or group consensus features like Yahoo 360 are services that Become will look into. User referrals like blogs and user and merchant reviews from multiple sources are also increasingly popular in Japan. As we develop our technology, we will look to include user ratings that are aggregated from multiple sources. We are also exploring adding the capability to allow users to submit their own comments.

The press release states that there is a partnership between Become and transcosmos. Are you personally an employee of Become or transcosmos?
Become Japan is an independent entity created through a joint venture with Become.com and transcosmos. I am an employee of Become Japan.

Become.com is providing the technology and transcomos is helping with the back end/office support. This allows the Become Japan team to stay focused on building the business.

What Japanese online trends surprise you for not having made their way to the US?
Mobile services for ecommerce haven’t yet made it to the US in a big way, as they have in Japan. The current Japanese ecommerce market totals approximately $60B. Mobile ecommerce in Japan makes up 15% of that market and is growing. Clearly this is a strong opportunity for Become Japan when it launches its mobile services.
Garrett French - MarketSmart Interactive | permalink | +marktd |