Oriental Consultants Holdings Co., Ltd.

Overseas operations offer increasing promise. We spoke with a key employee in our international business about existing know-how and prospects.

What specific overseas work are you engaging in?
My job is to produce master plans for urban transportation initiatives. We survey and quantitatively evaluate daily traffic to formulate master plans. We create 20-year demand forecasts that factor in demographic shifts and industrial and other economic considerations. We draw on these plans to create development, operations, and management proposals for road, railway, bus, and other of transportation modes. While the surveys and analysis are time-consuming, proposals need ample quantitative evidence to be persuasive. My work currently focuses on Indonesia, which has the world’s fourth-largest population and is a fast-growing member of the G-20. Its economy is strong but it is suffering from heavy traffic congestion and pollution because of a surge in the number of cars and motorcycles. We can provide technological assistance in numerous areas, so I think there is massive business potential for us in the years ahead.

What does it take to build international operations?
We sometimes have to start from scratch because we often don’t have the manuals that are par for the course in Japan. We have to understand local temperaments and political conditions and build trust with people with different languages, customs, and cultures. There are so many worldwide opportunities for us to demonstrate our capabilities. More and more ACKG people want to work abroad. Accumulating such experience while young greatly sustains one’s growth as a consultant in Japan and overseas. I would like to train promising employees, particularly young ones, and help develop many more countries.

G-20: The Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, which meets annually to explore ways to foster global economic stability and growth.

ACKG launched its comprehensive management business to provide practical management services for public parks. Here, we explore this promising new business.

Interviewer: Tell us how you secured an order to manage the Alps Azumino National Government Park and describe the work involved.
Yabuuchi: Foundations used to run national parks in Japan, but the government opened up management to competitive bids from the private sector as part of public service reforms (under the Market Test*). We must constantly improve quality at lower costs.
Kawamoto: We were asked to present a 13-point proposal for the competition, and were assessed based on an aggregate score. We had to show how we would increase visitor numbers, enhance satisfaction, and ensure security and safety. We eventually submitted more than 100 proposals.
Yabuuchi: We heard that we rated very highly for our ideas on park maintenance and management, technologies for extending service lives, and feasibility. The contract was between an Oriental Consultants-led consortium including three other companies and the Kanto Regional Development Bureau of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. We manage the park with those three companies, which oversee facility management, vegetation, and the profit-making facilities. The business is worth about ¥1.6 billion over roughly three years.
Kawamoto: We are in charge of the overall management and such areas as public relations and planning. We hold more than 20 events a year, such as a winter illumination and such hands-on programs as arts and crafts and buckwheat noodle-making. In addition, we share information on issues at the park in once-week meetings with consortium partners to improve customer satisfaction.

Interviewer: What new capabilities are necessary to secure orders in areas like park management orders and be successful in such businesses?
Yabuuchi: You need to broaden your knowledge beyond construction consulting to encompass other types of work and be able to collaborate with others. You have to communicate well with tourism, food, and other companies and get them working together. As business becomes borderless, we need to acquire skills to review businesses and produce proposals that extend well beyond our fields and technological strengths.
Kawamoto: First of all, we want to succeed in managing Alps Azumino National Government Park and build a new business model. We then aim to apply the comprehensive management expertise gained here to handle town management, notably for roadside stops, car parks, libraries, sports gyms, and other facilities.
Yabuuchi: At the same time, our work should not simply be about making money. We must also contribute to communities in the process. Our mission is revitalize communities through the way we do business.

Market Test: A public and private tender system that draws on innovations from private businesses to provide quality, low-cost public services.

ACKG’s solid technologies underpin its proposal capabilities. In this section, we explore the technological strengths we have cultivated over the years and the business thoughts of some of our engineers.

Interviewer: Explain your areas of expertise and your supporting technologies and strengths.
Itonaga: Since joining the company, I have focused mostly on soil remediation. I started out investigating leaks from a gasoline station that was being dismantled. We have secured more orders from developers and general contractors since the government revised the Soil Contamination Countermeasures Act in 2003. No other companies can match our swift onsite analytical technique, which the City of Tokyo authorized.
Sakamori: My work is all about planning and engineering water supply systems. For example, we present waterworks proposals to local governments and companies, covering everything from repairs, renovation planning, development, and design, to operations, management, and water charge setups. In Komatsu, Ishikawa Prefecture, we cut operating costs around 30% by constructing a distribution control system at an existing facility. I feel great when a customer tells me how what we have done has made facilities operations and management much easier.
Sakamori: I conduct environmental assessments, particularly for road noise. The process starts with monitoring roadside noise and vibration and quantifying the results. I create an optimization proposal based on the findings. Most of my work recently has been in combating noise. An academic society created a noise prediction model that incorporated my research into low-noise (and advanced) pavements that channel noise into the ground. The model is now an approved assessment tool.

Interviewer: ACKG’s prime strength is that it offers one-stop, comprehensive proposal capabilities. What would you like your successors to do to enhance quality?
Itonaga: The first of all, I’d like them to reinforce Group synergies. We are currently working with Oriental Consultants on the geological survey of a tunnel. Bringing Chuou Sekkei Engineering into the mix would expand our capabilities in areas like waste treatment. I think the range of consulting work will increase, particularly regarding legal expertise in areas like water contamination and soil pollution. Fieldwork is essential to accumulating such knowledge and technologies. Sometimes discoveries come only from hands-on experience.
Sakamori: It’s important not just to read the technical literature within the office but also to visit facility administrators and see what they are doing. Knowledge becomes wisdom when you bring technologies and applications together.
Sakamori: That’s true. Individual skills are important in this industry. As a company, we need comprehensive capability, but everyone needs a specialty. So, I hope employees can further refine their capabilities by seeking more opportunities to announce results in front of experts from academic societies and leverage the ACKG’s connections within our industry.