Director’s Message

Tsuyoshi Setoguchi

Executive Vice President, Executive Director of the Institute for the Promotion of Business-Regional Collaboration, Hokkaido University

Hokkaido University has declared the basic philosophies of “Frontier Spirit,” “Global Perspectives,” “All-round Education,” and “Practical Learning,” and we have been making broad contributions to society through our world-class research and education throughout our history.
As people began to look to universities more than ever before for initiatives aimed at solving difficult social issues, Hokkaido University launched the Institute for the Promotion of Business-Regional Collaboration in April of 2015, with the intention of responding to society’s needs. We are working both to promote collaboration between academia and industry, aimed at developing real-world applications for research findings, as well as regional collaboration intended to tackle region-specific challenges, and also to show others how fascinating research can be, in order to help more people feel connected to the scientific community and desire to support our efforts. As a platform for creating new social value by working alongside industry partners, local governments, and other organizations, we are advancing the development and protection of intellectual property and strongly promoting government-industry-academia collaboration, including large-scale inter-organizational collaborative research, as exemplified by our industry creation laboratories.
Collaborative activities, both those conducted between industry and academia and among regional partners, are supported by basic research, which grows out of the passions, ideas, and analysis conducted by researchers. We firmly believe that basic research leads to the development of technologies and insights across a wide range of fields, forming the foundation for new sciences and technology 10 or even 20 years into the future. Making contributions by appropriately returning some of our focus to basic research is another of our goals. 
At Hokkaido University, we hold a distinctive position as the key research university in the Hokkaido region. In order to further improve our research capabilities, we have plans to reevaluate our existing research support systems, build collaborative research platforms to promote the development of new research fields and facilitate intensive research, and identify promising researchers and conduct seamless support. As we look to the future, our upcoming initiatives will not be limited to the University. We will continue to branch out across Hokkaido via the Hokkaido University Alliance, and also implement projects with a view toward collaborating with partners across Japan and overseas. Moreover, we will provide support to startups and other organizations that were built using Hokkaido University’s intellectual property or other resources, and also develop the human resources needed to operate these companies. In addition, we will advance our ability to provide entrepreneurship education.
In these ways, we will build an ecosystem in which the "Excellence" in education and research and "Extension" – the ability to expand education and research into society and solve regional issues – presented in Hokkaido University’s "HU VISION 2030" can grow together.
We look forward to receiving your support and understanding as we continue to operate our programs guided by these key philosophies.