Yushiro Kato Podcast Transcript
Yushiro Kato joins host Brian Thomas on The Digital Executive Podcast.
Welcome to Coruzant Technologies, home of the Digital Executive Podcast.
[00:00:12] Brian Thomas: Welcome to The Digital Executive. Today’s guest is Yushiro Kato. Yushiro Kato is the co-founder of CADDI, known for his expertise in procurement strategy. He began his career at McKinsey and Company after graduating from Tokyo University in 2014. At McKinsey, he worked as an engagement manager, leading procurement and IOT initiatives in the manufacturing industry.
His time at the firm gave him insights into the pain points of the procurement sector. In November 2017, Yushiro founded CADDI a manufacturing platform that automates the connection between buyers and suppliers guided by the mission, unleash the potential of manufacturing. Under Yushiro’s leadership, CADDI has achieved notable success, earning recognition like a spot on Forbes 30 under 30 in 2019.
The company has secured 164 million in total funding, supporting its mission to transform the manufacturing landscape.
Well, good afternoon, Yushiro, welcome to the show.
[00:01:09] Yushiro Kato: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Brian.
[00:01:11] Brian Thomas: Absolutely. Thank you for jumping on and doing a podcast, first thing. This is just amazing getting out of bed every day to meet a new person and getting to share their story behind the mic.
So again, appreciate that. And Yushiro, we’re going to just jump right into the questions here. You’ve got quite a career in finance, economics, technology as an engagement manager, and now you’re the founder and CEO of CADDI. Could you share with our audience the secret to your career growth and what inspires you?
[00:01:42] Yushiro Kato: Yeah absolutely. So, throughout my career, the biggest driving force for me has been the natural curiosity, I would say. And I tried to make the best of the resources and opportunities I’ve had. And when I was in university, I chose to study economics and finance, but I spend most, almost no time in traditional lecture halls.
Instead, I was more immersed in my sports club, which was ice hockey and my own business ideas. So, I started my own startup in my university days. And creating something new and seeing it make people’s lives better is an indescribable feeling. So, I got to think I want to do something bigger and more impactful.
But I realized I didn’t know much about the real-world challenges of big industries. And to fill the gap, I decided to join McKinsey and I dove deep into the manufacturing world because it’s massive but there’s a tremendous room for improvement So there’s so much room to bring in new ideas and technology.
So, all these learnings and the passion to make a difference led me to where I am today, and that’s how I got to start CADDI.
[00:02:45] Brian Thomas: That’s awesome. And at the end of the day, when you truly are trying to solve a problem and you have a passion to make the world a better place, it’s just a perfect recipe for success.
So, thank you again. Yushiro your platform touts that it enables cost reduction in design, procurement and production departments through high precision, similarity searches on the most important digital asset in manufacturing drawings. Can you briefly share some of the process here?
[00:03:14] Yushiro Kato: Of course, the manufacturing industry faces a unique challenge.
So even though companies regard their drawings as the most important assets, they often don’t fully capitalize on past data. So, it’s common to find old drawings either on paper or in PDF format, buried in a mountain of files. So, this makes… Accessing data from, say, 5 years ago, almost like searching for a needle in a haystack.
So, they end up replicating similar designs repeatedly on the rare of existing, almost identical drawings. So, our platform, CADDI-Drawer, revolutionizes this. So, using AI technology, it transforms the company’s domain drawing archives into active assets. The AI can scan and comprehend every detail on the drawing, even handwritten ones.
So, this allows users to effortlessly search their archives, much like using Google. Using any keyword on the drawing and also drawer recognizes the shapes of the parts, as you said, and can suggest similar parts previously designed within the organization. So no more remaking designs that someone might have already crafted a decade ago, and by reusing and standardizing designs, companies can reduce the variety of parts.
which in turn reduces costs. And additionally, Drawer can integrate value supply chain data from part costs and supplier names to past quality issues. So this comprehensive view empowers procurement teams, enabling them to make cost effective decisions, supply selections by comparing similar designs in the past and their associated costs and suppliers.
[00:04:49] Brian Thomas: I love that it’s almost like having a process improvement program running alongside your organization, your manufacturing company. Obviously using AI as that, automated process improvement manager, which is totally awesome. I appreciate the sharing on that. Yushiro. Yushiro, what was the genesis of your idea and what sparked you to jump into this field as an entrepreneur?
[00:05:11] Yushiro Kato: Yeah. So, as I said, I was at the university, I already had my own business and that’s when I got to think, I want to do something bigger, but specifically on CADDI-Drawer. Actually, we have one more business in it, which is CADDI- manufacturing. And this is something I started six years ago. And it’s a procurement platform to support our engineering and procurement customers on sourcing custom made parts.
And they send us drawings and we select the best suppliers among our supply partner network globally and produce and deliver parts. And actually one weekend in the first year of CADDI, I found myself buried in a mountain of literally 2000 design drawings on papers from clients. And I was trying to sort through them all, figuring out which supplier was the best fit for each one.
And it was tedious and time consuming. So, by Sunday evening, I knew there had to be a better way to handle this. So, I talked to my CEO about visualizing the whole process to make it faster and more efficient. And the result was CADDI-Drawer. So, it became our digital tool to automatically organize and understand these designs, letting us swiftly connect our clients with the right suppliers.
And it was a game changer and we’ve been actually using that CADDI-Drawer internally. And I knew there were the same needs in the market too. So, we started CADDI-Drawer.
[00:06:32] Brian Thomas: Love the story. Again, finding that there’s a serious problem that needs to be addressed and having the passion to push on through and design a solution that is actually going to make things better and obviously a better customer experience for everybody all around.
So, thanks again. Yushiro, you’re obviously leveraging some new and emerging technologies in your business. Is there anything you might be able to share with us today?
[00:06:56] Yushiro Kato: Yeah, of course. Our technological edge comes in part because of the talent that people we have in our co-founder and CDO, for instance, he was in Apple in the West coast in charge of iPhone and Apple’s development, and he’s a true tech enthusiast or as a geek.
And we also have over 100 software engineers. A lot of them have expertise in AI. And at the end of the day, our goal is more than just using technology. It’s about leading industrial innovation in the manufacturing field. So, our mission is to unleash the potential of manufacturing and our commitment to this mission drives us every day.
And we are excited to be on this journey of innovation and transformation.
[00:07:39] Brian Thomas: I love it. Thank you. I appreciate that. And the fact that you’re employing some of the latest technologies with your engineering practice is just awesome. We do appreciate that. Appreciate the gems you shared with us today and Yushiro, I really look forward to speaking with you real soon.
[00:07:55] Yushiro Kato: Yeah. It was a pleasure for me to be here. Thank you.
[00:07:57] Brian Thomas: Bye for now.
Yushiro Kato Podcast Transcript. Listen to the audio on the guest’s podcast page.
