Mitsubishi HC Capital held one of Japan’s largest ideathon events for open innovation, aiming to serve as a hub for new businesses and expand its business into a new domain beyond the framework of its leasing and financing business.

Mitsubishi HC Capital held CLAP WakBiz in November 2025 as one of Japan’s largest ideathon events for new business creation in terms of the numbers of both participants and participating companies. CLAP WakBiz provides participants from companies across industries with an opportunity leading to the creation of new businesses in an exciting but feasible manner and is intended to revitalize open innovation through the creation of ideas for new businesses and the establishment of new relationships among those in charge of business development at various companies. Through this event, Mitsubishi HC Capital serves as a bridge connecting participating companies while also aiming to gain an opportunity itself to build a new business pillar beyond its conventional leasing and financing business.

CLAP is a team that was formed within Mitsubishi HC Capital’s Digitalization Strategy Planning Department in October 2023. In cooperation with the company’s sales department, the team researches and identifies external companies to partner with, build relationships, and evaluate the feasibility of new business ideas. An acronym for “collaborate, link, achieve, and progress,” CLAP is about working together internally and externally (collaborate), bringing together the strengths of different companies (link), carrying out tasks with a strong will (achieve), and moving forward together (progress) to ultimately praise all those involved with applause (CLAP).
CLAP WakBiz is held by inviting mainly those in charge of new businesses at large companies that have ties with CLAP through their daily business operations. It was launched in 2024 to provide unconnected companies with an opportunity to build new ties with one another for co-creation. The latest round of the event, the third round, was held under the sponsorship of East Japan Railway, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, MITSUBISHI ESTATE, J. FRONT RETAILING, TOSHIBA, and Tokyo Marunouchi Innovation Platform (TMIP) operated by Mitsubishi Estate. A total of 241 people (171 employees in charge of new businesses and 70 other employees) from 104 companies, many of which are listed companies, participated in the event.

In order to realize “Our 10-year Vision,” Mitsubishi HC Capital upholds the evolution and layering of business models as one of its business strategies under the Medium-term Management Plan for FY2023–FY2025 and is striving to add value to its existing businesses and develop new businesses. The ideathon event is part of the company’s efforts to realize this goal and is designed to provide participants with an opportunity to create innovation. The company also intends to foster the evolution of business models for new business development by cooperating with a range of partners through the event.

CLAP WakBiz was launched to help large companies create new businesses truly through open innovation. Behind the name “WakBiz” lies the CLAP team’s commitment in leading the event toward the actual development of new businesses, not simply holding it as an exciting one-off event.
However, in the past, many new business creation events ended up simply calling for participation. Ryosuke Takahashi, Digitalization Strategy Planning Department of Mitsubishi HC Capital, said as follows:

“Although there are various communities and events organized for those in charge of new business development at large companies, participants often end up merely exchanging their business cards, with no specific results achieved.”
In view of this fact, Mitsubishi HC Capital held the third round of CLAP WakBiz by delivering the following four messages:

“Events for open innovation should no longer be a mere opportunity to exchange business cards: Someone needs to draw a blueprint for co-creation.” “Large companies can do more by collaborating with each other: Open innovation is not limited to innovation promoted through collaboration among startups. Large companies can also collaborate to achieve more.”
“Let’s hit upon new ideas more freely from a new perspective: New value can be created by combining the strengths of companies and people who have no mutual contacts in their daily operations, rather than only focusing on those who have daily contact.”
“Let’s try first: We should do what we can do promptly right now. It might take a lot of time for us to do it on our own. If we spend several years on it, everything around us might change before we complete it.”

Also, Kohei Asai, Digitalization Strategy Planning Department said, “It was indeed meaningful for us to launch this event. For the third round, we sent the four messages to show our serious commitment to it, and also improved the content. As a result, we received more expectations from participants for the third round than for the previous rounds.”

So, what concrete effects did the event bring about?

“The ideathon has created chemistry between participants in an unprecedented manner. Some participants have continued to interact with other participants since the event, while others are examining the proposed ideas on a continual basis. They are thus proactively conducting activities to move to the next step. We would like to establish this event as a forum that truly leads participants to the development of new business through open innovation, and to serve as a bridge to connect participating companies for co-creation opportunities,” said Mr. Takahashi.

The third round of WakBiz was held at the TAKANAWA GATEWAY Convention Center for four hours starting from 1:00 p.m. on November 5, 2025. At the beginning of the event, Entrepreneur Minoru Moriya, who is supporting the launch and growth of many businesses, gave a special speech about how to create a new business based on his own experience.

Subsequently, a practical workshop was held on the issues faced by sponsor companies (excluding TMIP). Participants were grouped into teams, each composed of four to five people representing at least three companies, forming a total of 50 teams. (The team composition and the issues to be dealt with were announced on the day.) The teams, each seated at their own table, examined and proposed ideas for each of the issues faced by the sponsor companies. Then, juries selected by the sponsors (company officers and departmental heads) evaluated the ideas proposed to solve their companies’ issues, selecting excellent ideas and awarding prizes to the teams that formulated them.

Concerning the evaluation criteria used to select excellent ideas, Mr. Takahashi said, “The secretariat of the event does not set any evaluation standards. Each of the sponsor companies selects ideas by assessing their feasibility and novelty and other criteria from their own perspective and for their own reasons.”

At the latest round of the event, the third round, East Japan Railway selected the “TOUCH DE VOICE” system, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries selected “Smart Relief” (service to mitigate crowded restrooms in large facilities), MITSUBISHI ESTATE selected “Marunouchi-mura,” J. FRONT RETAILING selected “SHINSAIBASHI SMART POC.” and TOSHIBA selected “VisitTicket” as outstanding ideas.

In February 2026, three months after the organization of the event, a follow-up social meeting named “Mini-ideathon” will be held for the event participants to engage in deeper exchanges with one another.

“We do not aim to get involved in all the projects launched through the event. We simply want to serve as a hub for the creation of new businesses. Some ideas proposed at the event are under examination. What we aim to do is to help increase the feasibility of the ideas proposed at the event and provide participants with an opportunity to deepen their mutual networks through the event,” said Mr. Asai.

Toward the fourth round of the event, Mr. Takahashi made the following comment:

“From the perspective of collaboration among large companies, we would like to enhance open ties at an on-site level between Mitsubishi Group companies, which can do much more by collaborating with each other. The ties thus created will lead to the creation of new businesses and support Japan’s sustainable growth. We hope that the Mitsubishi Group will lead the networking of large Japanese companies for further growth.”