Mercari operates an application that makes it easy to sell and buy various things like a flea market through smartphones and others.

The company decided to advance research and development of the latest technology with five universities such as the University of Tokyo and the University of Tsukuba, as well as electric manufacturers, in order to make AI = artificial intelligence and improve service usability.

Specifically, when users submit merchandise in an application, they can instantly find similar items that have already been exhibited just by taking pictures of the products and can confirm the price To do. In addition, we will conduct a research to estimate the whole image from the photograph of the exhibited commodity so that it can be seen from various angles.

In addition, we aim to advance technology development so that we can deal with virtual currency in the future, and introduce it to Mercari's service within a few years.

Merkari's Shintaro Yamada, Chairman and CEO, said, "Although our Furima application has developed with user-friendliness, we will continue to differentiate it from other companies with technology."

In the IT industry, LINE, a major communication application company, collaborated with the National Institute of Informatics for research and development of AI, and cooperated with external organizations to incorporate the latest technology into its service The movement is getting active.