It is because funds are limited for venture projects that we believed that engaging in research with AIST could yield greater results for less cost.
Toresyoku Co., Ltd.
【Persons interviewed】
Toresyoku Co., Ltd.
Satoshi Okimura, Representative Director
Masashi Oka, Director
Yuya Ishimaru, Chief Researcher
Research for the company really took off when they started consulting with AIST on matters of technology. The company makes bio-materials derived from discarded vegetation.
Established in 2018, Toresyoku Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Toresyoku”) decomposes and extracts cellulose from discarded vegetables and plant matter, evaluates the properties of this cellulose, and sells it as a bio-material alternative to plastics and other such materials. The properties of and suitable method of using extracted cellulose vary depending on the vegetable or plant matter from which it was extracted. As a company that studies these properties and develops new materials, Toresyoku began a partnership with the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (hereinafter referred to as “AIST”; includes AIST Solutions) in October 2023.
We reached out to Representative Director Satoshi Okimura and Director Masashi Oka of Toresyoku as well as Yuya Ishimaru, who is involved in this research project while working out of AIST’s Chugoku Center, and talked about how the company came to partner with AIST, the advantages of this partnership, and the results that were obtained through this partnership.
(Left to right) Yuya Ishimaru, Chief Researcher; Satoshi Okimura, Representative Director; Masashi Oka, Director
Making useful bio-materials from discarded materials
Okimura: What we aim to do through our business is to decompose discarded material with technology that is not environmentally harmful and provide the results of this process to the world as new materials, such as bioplastics. Waste material of this type consists for the most part of unused agricultural plant residue, such as tomato stems and cabbage cores, much of which in turn is composed of cellulose. These days, research to develop new materials based on the use of cellulose is underway. At the same time, we are also looking for a way we can use the decomposed materials that remain after the cellulose has been extracted. We believe that discarding the decomposed materials that remain would ultimately place a burden on the environment. Discarding anything incurs a cost. Given that we, as a venture company, are also looking—rather selfishly perhaps—to grow, we seek to build a strong management structure by building a business that discards nothing.
We began our company out of a desire to create foodstuff from discarded materials. Unfortunately, foods grown in Fukushima Prefecture, where our head office is located, suffered a reputational hit due to the nuclear power plant accident that occurred here in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake. We realized that this was not a problem that was going to go away anytime in the next few years. In this connection, we wondered whether we could, by creating products, even if not food, useful to people from discarded materials, promote sustainability, reduce food loss, and help achieve carbon neutrality. This is the process through which we as a company came to operate in the manner that we do today.
A partnership is formed through a convergence of goals for research into the development of a new form of cellulose
Okimura: We began researching cellulose after we formed a commitment to developing our business based on cellulose. In contrast to what we used for cellulose, most other companies in our line of work were working with cellulose extracted from wood, such that there was virtually no research that had been done on plant-derived cellulose that did not come from wood.
At the time, we were assisted in our research by Ishimaru, a graduate student belonging to the Graduate School of Chemical Sciences and Engineering at Hokkaido University. It should be noted that we were starting out from a position of trying to figure out how we can study the properties and functions of cellulose not extracted from wood. We inquired with researchers at various universities, including Hokkaido University, but found nobody who was engaged in research on the properties of cellulose extracted from different types of plants. It was then that we met an official with the Small and Medium Enterprise Agency at an event in Tohoku that we happened to be participating in. That official introduced us to someone from AIST in Tohoku. In the course of our conversation on our predicament, we came to learn of research on cellulose being conducted by AIST’s Chugoku Center, located in Higashi-Hiroshima City.
While the Chugoku Center used to be engaged in research on cellulose derived from wood, it shifted its focus in recent years to the study of cellulose nanofibers, which are drawing greater attention from industry as a new material. Cellulose nanofibers are fine fibers made by untangling cellulose down to nano-scale filaments and are one-fifth as heavy as steel and more than five times as strong. Because they are so lightweight and strong, they are expected to be used to produce bodies for cars. Cellulose nanofibers derived from wood, however, are very expensive to make, such that the price can reach 10,000 yen or more per kilogram in some cases.
A proposal was then put forth by the Chugoku Center. Shouldn’t we try making cellulose nanofibers from raw materials other than wood? In the course of handling cellulose derived from non-wood materials, we wondered whether it might not be possible to create nano-scale fibers without relying on such a costly process. Thus, discussions brought the two of us together through a desire to conduct research into cellulose derived from non-wood materials. From that point forward, talks progressed at a very rapid pace.
Oka: There were, broadly speaking, two benefits that we hoped to achieve through our partnership with AIST.
On the first point, we were aware that AIST employed many people who had developed a high degree of expertise at various different universities and greedily hoped to absorb their knowledge and harness it for our research. While we could make cellulose not derived from wood, we simply lacked the means by which we could learn about the functions of and identify the potential uses for such cellulose. We thus wanted to access and make use of the wealth of knowledge possessed by everyone at AIST.
On the second point, AIST has every piece of hardware you might need when you seek to transition what you managed to develop in the lab to full-scale production equipment and evaluate the properties of the material under those conditions. When we didn’t have the equipment necessary for production ourselves, we naturally had to ask outside facilities or manufacturers to use what they had instead. This was exceedingly difficult to pull off as it meant that we had to travel and meet with other parties at various locations nationwide and then book times and wait for our turn at every step along the way.
It appears that the timing was also fortuitous at the time talks on forming a partnership were underway. Back then, the national government had set aside a substantial budget for the prioritization of research into cellulose nanofibers and AIST was using these funds to build up its analytical facilities and other capital assets. While we also naturally wanted to engage in research on a joint basis, AIST promptly visited our head office in Fukushima Prefecture with at least the same level of passion as we harbored and let us know in no uncertain terms that they wanted to support us in our cellulose-related operations.
Ishimaru: We concluded a technical consulting agreement with AIST and began our partnership on a full-fledged basis in October 2023. Since then, we have been studying cellulose derived from various different plant materials to determine their properties and conducting research on the technology for blending such cellulose with plastic while receiving advice from AIST. Our research lab is situated at Hokkaido University, but I’m currently doing research at the Chugoku Center for around eighty percent of each month. We would love to maintain this partnership with AIST for a long time to come. We hired a local assistant and the two of us are making progress. AIST even helped us with hiring this individual.
We believe that the benefits that we have obtained from this agreement far outweigh the amount of the agreement
Ishimaru: These days, regular meetings with AIST are held around twice a month. During these meetings, we update them on the progress that has been achieved with our research and receive specific advice on what we should do to in terms of the evaluation of properties going forward. While it has only been a few months since the agreement was concluded and this partnership was fully implemented, substantial results have already been obtained. Whether in terms of knowledge or hardware, I truly believe that our technology would not have been possible were it not for the existence of AIST.
Okimura: That’s exactly right. I don’t believe that clean tech start-ups like us and venture companies engaged in deep-tech ventures like us have options that don’t involve the use of knowledge and equipment that AIST possesses. The contract fee for technology consulting might appear at first glance to be high in terms of the outlay that is required but I believe that the benefits that have been obtained are many times greater than the amount concerned. Let’s say that we chose to instead buy all the equipment we normally use for our research. That would be enormously expensive. There are also times when an issue that we might spend a month on research for can be resolved with a simple piece of advice offered by AIST. That single month of in-house research would have incurred several million yen in labor costs had we gone down that road. Some venture companies may not be able to afford [partnering with AIST] but it is precisely between they are venture companies with limited funds that engaging in research together with AIST would allow them to achieve meaningful results at low cost.
Ishimaru: The other day, I participated in workshops on developing human resources as hosted by the Chugoku Center’s own Nano-Cellulose Studio and found it to be tremendously useful. Through these workshops, you can learn about everything from basic knowledge of cellulose to the process of blending cellulose with resin to create products by attending a series of lectures over the course of two to three months. This involves visits to four different institutes, including AIST, the Kyoto Municipal Institute of Industrial Technology and Culture, and universities. I was able to ask questions about some concerns that we were having and receive solutions to all of our problems in the course of these workshops.
The participants at these workshops were highly diverse. You naturally had participants from the paper industry, which is directly related to cellulose, but you also had participants from industries that didn’t seem to have much of a connection to cellulose at all and who professed ignorance about cellulose but were eager to learn. A bit over twenty companies participated. I was able to deepen connections with other participants and continue to cultivate a relationship with some of them by exchanging information to this day. Someone from one company even expressed to me an interest in the cellulose that Toresyoku produces, such that I can say that we might even have expanded our business opportunities in the process.
We hope to make our foray into the global market with new materials in the next two to three years
Okimura: Going forward, we want to someday create new materials that surpass cellulose nanofibers, which are described as being highly versatile, from discarded items. And we would like to sell these materials and the technology behind them to the world and thereby let the world know that this company and its technologies emerged from a place that experienced the devastation of an earthquake.
In terms of initiatives related to SDGs, we would also like to make sure that the world recognizes that we are engaged in such initiatives in Japan as a company representing Japan.
We actually have no desire to possess our own manufacturing sites. Instead, we seek to collaborate with local companies and make materials through the effective use of plant materials that are discarded in large quantities in each region. SDGs allow humanity to live in a state of peace and security in perpetuity. These goals cannot be achieved unless we are able to solve local issues.
It has been several years since the term SDGs first came to be quietly voiced. The term circular economy can also be commonly heard these days. Nevertheless, Japan overwhelmingly lags behind the rest of the world when it comes to these notions. We would like to harness our technologies for sustainability in order to realize a recycling-oriented society and help spread this way of thinking across the country. I would like to see these aspects of our vision all come to fruition in the next two to three years.
Oka: In realizing our vision, we would like to receive sound advice and support from AIST that is firmly grounded when it comes to research considerations. As a business, we can’t help but think in terms of profit and efficiency. For this reason, it would be great if AIST could hold down the fort when it comes to the fundamental aspects of our research.
Okimura: I would like to treat AIST as a friend with whom we can be a partner going forward. It is understood that AIST has various rules to which it must adhere in contrast to private-sector companies. We are a company that engages in research for the purpose of making money while AIST is primarily interested in achieving great success with each research project. Given the substantial differences between the two, it is inevitable to see gaps emerge in our respective ways of thinking. Since we are both passionate about research, however, I’d like to see us remain partners who are honest with one another through this passion that we both share. We expect that AIST Solutions will play a role in connecting AIST with our company and believe that this will allow a flexible relationship transcending the boundary between the public and private sectors to be built by both parties.
