The Nikkei reported today that Japanese group-ware developer Cybozu is planning to launch an office in California next year, with the goal of globally launching its Kintone cloud service [1]. The service is a corporate communication tool comprising of multiple business applications, helping you share information smoothly with your colleagues.

In terms of differentiation from conventional tools, this service lets you use a custom set of applications on the suite or even develop an application for it by yourself. There is also a marketplace where users can buy and add various apps from third-party developers, so you can create a knowledge-sharing environment that fits your business.

According to the company’s CEO Yoshihisa Aono, the service has already acquired about 700 corporate users — ranging from big companies to SMEs — since its launch in the fall of 2011.

The company was founded back in 1997 by Japanese software entrepreneur Toru Takasuka. It was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange within three years of its launch, which at the time was one of the fastest company in history to IPO. With the company’s product dominating the Japanese group-ware market, it set up a US subsidiary back in San Francisco in 2002 to intensify its global marketing efforts. But the office was subsequently shut down in 2005 due to somewhat sluggish performance.

Back in 2010, the company set up a subsidiary focused on accelerating startups, and more than a few web services have been born out of that initiative.

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1. Note that the Nikkei article is paywalled.  ↩