Interview with Finnish AR/VR company, ZOAN Japan
What does the Japanese AR/VR market look like, and what are some advantages and challenges for a Nordic company to enter Japan? To find out, we sat down with Paul Yang, Managing Director of ZOAN Japan, a member company of NIHTokyo, who kindly shared his insights and experiences.
Q: Thank you for sparing your time today. To start with, can you tell us a little bit about your personal background, including your history with Japan, and how you met ZOAN?
A: I am a Korean American, born and grew up in Japan. After having my higher education in the US and working in some European countries (including Finland), I came back to Japan 15 years ago. I’ve been based here since.
I first met ZOAN at SLUSH. My previous employer (real-estate operating company) was a sponsor of SLUSH, so I was attending the event regularly and was always on the look for interesting companies. I am an engineer by training so I’m curious about new technology.
When I first met the ZOAN team 4 years ago at SLUSH, I was fascinated by their technology (I am not a gamer, but I knew how their technology can be effective in the real estate industry). However, I felt that their quality was not yet ready for the Japanese market. We kept in touch, and finally around 2 years ago when I saw their product again, I felt like they were ready to enter the Japanese market.
At that time, I knew Mori was looking for an AR company for a project they had in mind, but they had not been able to find any domestic companies which would realize what they wanted to do. I was pretty sure ZOAN would be able to meet their standards, so I asked ZOAN to make a prototype of one of their real-estate development projects, and had Mori to try it out — turned out, they were super excited about it! Therefore, we moved forward to an official contract, which required ZOAN to have a Japanese entity with someone who speaks the language. So from there, I decided to take the role at ZOAN JAPAN.
Q: What are some other industries or projects that you are working with right now?
A: We have been receiving very interesting inquiries from many different Japanese companies. Currently, we have two projects going on in the film industry: one is an animation and the other one a science fiction production. For the animation one, we made a proof of concept for the customer, and they were very satisfied with it. The film distributor has already signed a letter of intent that they will distribute the movie when it’s finalized. Science fiction films need more effort than animation as you have to have more reality in them, but our technology caters to that as well. We are also working on a projection mapping project.
Another field that is interesting and which we keep getting inquiries on is the virtual concert world. The 2020 JVG concert in Finland was a bigger success than we had anticipated. The concert was sponsored so the audience didn’t have to pay for it, but we have experience from paid virtual concerts as well. This year, we were able to gather a revenue of 2M euro from 150,000 people attending a single concert. We’ve conducted a VR concert in Singapore as well.
We can also create VR exhibitions and VR forums with a similar type of technology. Right now, we are talking with Mori about a VR forum where we expect about 1000–2000 people to come in. This technology can be adapted to create VR markets too. For example, we can create a replica of a whole residential area, which will enable us to make transactions at the stores inside the replica.
Education is another interesting field. Some kids learn better when they see things, instead of reading. With VR, we can bring more entertainment to the education industry.
Last Christmas Finnair conducted a VR Santa tour with ZOAN. The ticket was 10€ per person, and it attracted around 9000 people. Finnair was very happy that they were able to generate this revenue without flying a plane (the profit was later donated to UNICEF), and that the event helped bring Finnair’s brand image very high. The participants were happy and there were no complaints about the experience. Interestingly, around 30% of the participants were from Japan, even though the tour was conducted in English.
Q: Why is ZOAN’s technology so well-accepted?
A: Our level of detail on the graphics is extremely high. We also have a great team of graphic and software professionals — you need to have a good combination of these two fields. We make sure that we have all the safety precautions in place. Cost-wise, we are economical and capable of implementing fast. Another aspect is that not only can we create the content, but we can also enable the content to be seen through the browser.
Q: ZOAN has been working on Virtual Helsinki, a digital twin of Helsinki City center. Can you tell us about it?
A: It started from the CEO’s personal idea. At first, the City of Helsinki had its doubts, but the CEO went on anyway to create a digital twin of the City center. After seeing the output, the City got interested and the collaboration started. Real-estate companies are now using it for pre-selling condos and introducing new commercial centers, and some art galleries have also used it. It’s becoming a more and more diverse tool for different purposes.
Q: Do you see any differences between Finland and Japan in the AR/VR field?
A: There are many Japanese companies who are interested in the field, but it seems that they are struggling on how to put everything together within a certain cost. They are currently gathering a lot of information, but the struggle seems to be to find people who are good at both writing code and making graphics, and who can actually realize what the customer would like to create.
Everybody seems to want to create their own VR platform, but the quality is not yet there for that. I also feel that Japanese companies are hesitant to collaborate. Whereas when I talk to big companies in Finland, everybody’s willing to collaborate and share knowledge. In Japan maybe people are too concerned about the profits they would make for themselves.
In order to be up-to-date with all the technology and the changes that are happening in the world market, being able to gather information in English, and being open and ready for collaboration, is a must.
Q: To conclude, please share with us any upcoming projects or milestones in the near future.
A: Mori Memorial Foundation has been a very good partner for us. Right now, we are working on some interior projects and the possibility of applying some transactions to their virtual world. Another area is film; we are finalizing a project that we have been working on for more than a year. Once that is done I hope to get more into the film industry. We are also working on a projection mapping project. If all these projects move forward, we’ll need to have some colleagues fly from Helsinki to Tokyo. We hope to welcome them towards the end of the year!
Thank you very much, Paul! To learn more about ZOAN and their recent activities, visit here.
This interview was conducted in July 2021
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