TOKYO, March 7, 2018 – From April, Fuji Xerox will sequentially roll out new services—which utilize the Company’s technologies in the fields of artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) and Internet of Humans (IoH)—based on the Company’s new value proposition strategy, Smart Work Innovation. To enhance the competitive power of businesses, the new services will liberate workers from restraints that would generate repetitive tasks, open professional expertise owned by a few specialists to everybody, provide a secure communication environment, and gather/analyze beneficial information to encourage workers to transform their workstyles to a creative one.

Fuji Xerox has continually assisted customers in streamlining their operations and improving productivity through offering industry- and operation-specific solutions and services. Based on the Smart Work Innovation strategy, the Company will further refine the values that its solutions and services provide with (a) proprietary Document AI*1 technologies developed through years of research, (b) next-generation security technology that has been strengthened through the provision of security-related products and services, and (c) IoT/IoH technologies fostered as a result of implementing them at customers and internally. Through the proof-of-concept opportunities at several customers, the new services have already been showing both quantitative and qualitative results.  

[Overview of upcoming services]

1. High-precision data entry service

A service that accurately recognizes handwritten information on paper forms and converts them into data suitable for computer processing, by using a model built utilizing proprietary AI technology that uses the mechanism of which a human processes visual information. This service will improve the work process of businesses that need to handle large quantities of handwritten forms, e.g. financial institutions and public sectors, where handwritten forms are still mainstream for various applications. In a verification test that was done at a financial institution, productivity in inputting data from handwritten forms saw a double improvement.

2. Information extraction service from engineering drawings

Fuji Xerox’s proprietary layout analysis technology and character recognition technology extract designated character strings from information scattered in drawings. This service will improve information-checking accuracy and work processes involved in maintenance tasks in industries such as manufacturing, housing and construction. For example, when construction companies make periodic maintenance of numerous facilities including dilapidated ones, they need to refer to large paper drawings that were created at the time the facilities were built, in order to acquire information on parts and components that are required for maintenance work. To extract such information from a pile of drawings, skilled professionals spend long hours, which would be reduced by this service. In a verification test that was done with a certain company, the time required for a professional to inspect drawings were reduced to half.

3. Expert knowledge systemization service

This service will enable anyone to find the association among various information—a task which depends upon professional knowledge or experience. With this service, the relevance between words among several documents can be extracted through proprietary natural language processing technology and systemized as ontology*2 using a linking technology.

For example, a manufacturing company that provides products to more than 100 countries and regions needs to have its products complied with the laws of each region. When a law is amended, that company needs to inspect its products’ specifications to see if the amendment would have an impact, and if so, it is required to change the specs to comply with the new law. Such task requires much time and effort of professionals. This new service would enable companies to improve their reviewing process in responding to legal reforms by being able to swiftly identify products/services and their specs applicable to the respective laws. In a verification test done with its own products at Fuji Xerox, the time required for a professional to create application forms required by laws was reduced by 80 percent by systemizing knowledge and automating the processes of checking drawings and parts data.

4. Cloud security service

As the latest closed network that is fast and stable, the service offers a secure network environment that integrates the office, cloud and mobile devices by leveraging Fuji Xerox’s unique insights on providing a secure network environment accumulated through “beat”—its secure network outsourcing service. Users can be assured with the comfort and safety of not only the Internet connection but mobile and IoT device telecommunications in this closed network. Fuji Xerox will further launch services that protect information assets from unknown malware that are constantly evolving.

5. Behavioral analysis optimization service

For organizational efficiency, businesses are required to improve the quality of work and communications. However, working styles and communications are difficult to visualize, thus hindering improvements. Fuji Xerox sees the amount of communication and the balance of dialogues as the key to improving work efficiency. The service utilizes IoT and IoH technologies developed through verifications done within Fuji Xerox and third parties to visualize and analyze the communications (dialogues) made between workers as well as their actions and status, which are difficult to identify. Based on such visualized data accumulated, Fuji Xerox will assist in providing an office environment that would enhance productivity by streamlined communications and prompts creativity, thus in reforming workstyles that would generate quality, better outcome.

With the ever-increasing competition amid globalization and technological innovation, improving work efficiency and competitiveness are sought while demonstrating creativity. Nevertheless, various restraints　are preventing work digitalization, productivity improvement, and forcing workers to commit much of their time. The inefficiency dampens the effects of expertise necessary to carry out business and ultimately hinders overall improvements in organizational competency as well as creativity.

Fuji Xerox will help businesses tackle these issues and improve productivity with the new services based on the Smart Work Innovation strategy.   

*1 Document AI is Fuji Xerox’s proprietary AI technology that extracts valuable intelligence from documents that piled up in offices and leverages them in business operations. Compared to conventional AI processing that is based on processing big data from the Internet, Document AI demonstrates sophisticated processing even with comparatively small data volume because it uses quality data.

*2  Ontology is a computer-processible data that was systemized by linking knowledge among various concepts

See the link below for details (Japanese):

http://www.fujixerox.co.jp/solution/promotion/innovation/

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