JBS Provides Workshop to Produce Practical Results with Microsoft 365 Copilot

Japan Business Systems, Inc. (Headquarters: Minato Ward, Tokyo; President: Yukihiro Makita; hereinafter, “JBS” securities code: 5036) today released Ideathon for Microsoft 365 Copilot, a workshop to think about how to incorporate and practice Microsoft’s generative AI functions for corporations, Microsoft 365 Copilot (hereinafter, “Copilot”), in daily operations, in order for companies to produce practical results utilizing generative AI. An ideathon is a portmanteau combining the words “idea” and “marathon.” It means a workshop held for the purpose of creating new ideas and finding highly effective solutions on a specific theme.

As the use of generative AI shifts from being used for FAQ purposes, to gaining answers from simple prompts, to producing results that can be used for specific tasks, inquiries are increasing from companies that cannot perceive scenarios for utilization of Copilot that would be suited to their operations. In this ideathon, facilitated by JBS, participants will take a value co-creation approach to come up with ideas for solving problems using Copilot and construct new operational scenarios that incorporate Copilot. The workshop aims to help companies take advantage of success stories using generative AI and connect their investment to appropriate results.

According to PWC’s survey report Generative AI Survey Spring 2024 (Japanese), while companies using generative AI increased by nine percentage points from 34% in autumn 2023 to 43% in spring 2024, the results were polarized between “exceeds expectations” and “falls below expectations.” However, interestingly, “appropriate usage case setting” is given as a factor that had an impact on the results for either case. This shows the current situation in which in-house development of employees’ AI literacy and skills is developing for the group for which generative AI greatly exceeded expectations, while on the other hand, employees’ generative AI training has not been fully promoted for the group for which generative AI fell below expectations.

In such circumstances, JBS has been providing services for companies to improve AI literacy and ensure consistent utilization. When considering taking the usage of generative AI further from establishment to usage to produce results, as can be seen from the PWC survey results, by experiencing the process of finding a solution through Copilot using actual problems faced by companies as usage cases, companies are able to realize appropriate return on investment for implementing generative AI. JBS has decided to provide this process through JBS’s methods as an ideathon.

JBS developed the ideathon jointly with general incorporated association Social Systems Design Center (hereinafter, “SSDC*”), an affiliated corporation. Starting from companies’ potential problems, we use generative AI based on “design thinking,” which goes through a process from empathizing to issue definition, idea creation, prototyping and testing, in order to identify operational issues and come up with ideas for solutions.

From dialogue with AI scientists and industry-academia-government collaborations it has experienced thus far, SSDC recognizes that having the companies that have the best understanding of the issues take the lead results in overwhelmingly faster introduction of solutions and increased satisfaction with the solutions themselves. This is why instead of a general consulting service in which a solution is presented based on interviewing a company, we thought that an ideathon in which companies and JBS hold discussions as equals to come up with solutions would be a suitable method to produce results using Copilot.

*SSDC: a JBS-affiliated corporation launched mainly by companies and scientists specializing in AI, IoT, and robotics. SSDC aims to search for solutions to problems and create new businesses in collaboration with entrepreneurs, universities, research institutions, administration, and investors.

For details, click here.

Ideathon for Microsoft 365 Copilot

JBS launched a Microsoft 365 Copilot verification team in August 2023, granting licenses to 300 employees to verify the usage plan and engage in establishing its use within the company. Later, after advancing business streamlining through Microsoft 365 Copilot and verifying business improvement effects, mainly by corporate divisions, its use was expanded to all approximately 2,500 employees in March 2024.
After the effects on actual work of the usage cases gathered from within the company are verified, we adapt them into ideas for customers’ business improvement measures as a real showcase and develop various services in combination with the knowledge we have accumulated through the provision of these services.