Tetsuro Yoshimatsu, President and CEO, iStyle Inc.

The spirit of inquiry and drive to think things through more than anyone else creates new value

Profile

Tetsuro Yoshimatsu
Graduated from the Faculty of Engineering Science, Tokyo University of Science.
After working at Accenture, he founded iStyle in 1999 and became its president and representative director. In the same year, he launched the comprehensive cosmetics and beauty website "@cosme."
He currently provides grant support to the arts and sports sectors through the iStyle Arts and Sports Promotion Foundation, a public interest incorporated association he founded, and is expanding the scope of his activities by serving as a director of the Japan Association of Corporate Executives.

iStyle Inc. operates the cosmetics industry platform "@cosme." Despite the high uncertainty surrounding the internet business at the time, President Yoshimatsu had absolute confidence in the success of the "@cosme" business. This was due to his strong desire to think things through, as well as his willingness to keep taking action and not shy away from new changes.

■School days

At the time, entrance exams were tough, so I got a recommendation and went on to Tokyo University of Science. I was in the Department of Bioengineering, but I wasn't particularly interested in that field, so I focused on how to enrich my life outside of class. I devoted myself to American football as part of a club activity, and did various part-time jobs such as karaoke, pizza delivery, private tutoring, and cram school teaching, and I was conscious of how different my environment would be from the one I was in now.

■Despite receiving numerous job offers, he decided to take a year off to find a job

Since I majored in bioengineering, I mainly applied to the pharmaceutical and food industries, but I felt contradictory in having to portray myself in interviews as someone who worked in those fields, even though I hadn't studied to work there. Despite this, I received a relatively large number of job offers, but when it came to choosing from them, the only way to compare was based on the company's annual salary, assets, and reputation. However, I realized that these standards were wrong, and I regretted having started my job search without deciding "what kind of people I want to work with and what kind of work I want to do." I decided to start over, decline all the job offers I received, and take a year off to find a job.

Foreign consulting companies were a minor industry at the time, but I felt it was a challenging environment that would help me grow, so I ultimately decided to work for Accenture. In my first year at the company, I struggled with my incompetence and the gap in ability between me and those around me. After two or three years, I finally started to feel like I could do my job well enough to be recognized by the company, and that's when the Internet began to take off. I was trying to explain my answers to people in their 40s and 50s about what the Internet would do to the world and how we could use it in our company, but it was difficult to get my point across, and I began to feel stressed. That's when I came up with the @cosme business model and decided to start my own company.

■ Thinking things through will lead to a business model you can be confident in

At the time, Amazon's stock price was at its lowest, and at first, I felt it would be difficult to make a profit in the e-commerce market. However, I thought that if I handled products like books that could be sold at a fixed price, like Amazon did with the publishing industry, I could make a decent profit in Japan. My partner at the time happened to be working for a cosmetics company, so we focused on cosmetics. At the time, there were very few businesses that utilized review sites and databases like there are today, but by showing my business plan to various people, receiving their feedback, and making repeated improvements, I was able to build a business model I was confident in. People's questions are never endless, and they will inevitably become saturated. By being able to answer them all, there will come a moment when I can confidently say, "I'm the one who has thought this business model out more thoroughly than anyone in Japan!" It's important to see things through to that point before starting.

■ Identify real competitors and take the initiative

There are many review sites offering good services these days, but I don't think that's where our real rivals are. For example, in magazines, while people are competing to see which brand is strongest in that field, the web and YouTube are on the rise, and I think that our real competitors may be e-commerce companies like Rakuten and Amazon. We are conscious of taking action after considering what society will be like in the future. It's important to think about how we can do new things in the future, and as a result, that has led to the current situation where we are focusing on both the internet and physical stores.

■ I want to work with people who have an open mind and strong will.

As a company grows and the number of employees increases, it can become a kind of chaotic situation. It's like expanding a diorama with the help of many different people, so it's important to have people who are determined to act in their respective areas of responsibility. People who have a strong desire to do things their own way, to learn, to create, and who are particular about the finished product. This shouldn't be pride, but rather an altruistic commitment that thinks of others, and in that sense it's important to be sensitive and honest. I want to work with people who have an open mind, free from prejudice or preconceptions, and who are willing to see, hear, and absorb all kinds of things.

■ Future dreams

I think COVID-19 has reset everything. Lifestyles and ways of thinking have changed dramatically, and it feels like everyone is back at the starting line. If things had continued as they were, I think we would have been fixed on what we could do and what we could think about now with an eye to the future, but in a world where the future is uncertain, it's exciting to think about what we can do 20 or 30 years from now and what new steps we can take. I don't have a clear vision of where I want to be in a certain number of years, but I do want to be someone who is always thinking and acting, and who can continue to provide value to society.

■Message

I think we are living in an age of opportunity. Some people may be struggling to find employment, but amid this turmoil, there are also people who are able to try new things because there are now more options that do not require employment for a while. It is not important to belong to a group, but to create an environment where you can act on your own, so I hope that people will continue to persevere, watch and listen, and keep moving forward.

Student newspaper WEB coverage on December 3, 2020

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