Yusuke Muranaka, Chief Operating Officer (COO) and CEO of EXNOA (DMM GAMES), DMM.com LLC

A company grows stronger by taking on new challenges and changing every day.

Chief Operating Officer (COO) of DMM.com LLC and CEO of EXNOA (DMM GAMES)　Yusuke Muranaka(Yusuke Muranaka)

■ Profile
Joined DMM.com in 2002. After working in sales for the video streaming business, he became the business manager and contributed to the expansion of the business. In 2011, he became a director and oversaw all digital services. He launched a wide range of businesses, including amusement and animation. In 2018, he became COO. In 2019, he also served as CEO of EXNOA (DMM GAMES). He currently oversees over 60 businesses.

DMM.com LLC has a corporate philosophy of "doing anything, regardless of field," and launches many new businesses every year. The company currently has a total of over 60 businesses, creating an environment where people can take on an ever-increasing variety of challenges. In response to this, COO Muranaka says, "We want people who can communicate with even more passion." What does the future hold for the DMM Group? We spoke to him about the appeal of the company and its future prospects.

I graduated from a technical high school in Tomakomai, Hokkaido, and immediately after graduating I moved to Tokyo to work for a construction company. Many people in my hometown simply follow a set path, but I wanted to live a different life, so I decided to move to Tokyo. However, the company I joined after graduating was quite difficult. At the time, I didn't know what to do, and my boss was always yelling at me. In the end, I worked at the construction company for four years, and then moved on to a DMM group company.

■ You can quickly put into shape what you want to do.

Since joining our company, I have enjoyed my work every day. One reason for this is the sheer volume of information available. When I changed jobs, the internet wasn't as developed as it is now, so I only knew my own environment and it was difficult to compare it with other companies, so I had no choice but to work hard there. However, our company has always been a rewarding environment for me, offering many challenges. Of course, nowadays it's easy to get information about a variety of companies, but even in this day and age, I still find our company to be an attractive place to work.
I believe the joy of working for an IT company is being able to "see the evolution of digital technology right before your eyes." There are many changes happening in the digital world right now, and witnessing them is what makes the job interesting. In addition to the fun of this industry, the DMM Group's strengths are its youth and scale. Many of our employees are in their 20s and 30s. And it's not just the young, energetic people we have gathered; the sheer size of our company is also key. Being large has the advantage of being able to rapidly commercialize the aspirations of our employees. There are few companies that combine both youth and scale, and I think our ability to quickly turn challenges into reality is unique to us.
In fact, half of the projects we undertake at our company are born from suggestions from our employees. That's why we want to increase the number of people in our company who are not just young, but who have their own unique interests and can turn them into passions. The type of people we are looking for can be summed up in one word as "people with humanity." It's difficult to put this humanity into words, but I feel that people who make others think, "I want to follow this person," have humanity.
The ideal environment would be one in which most employees have discretion in their work, and for that to happen, it is necessary to be able to delegate work to employees. In the future, I would like to further increase the number of young people who can be entrusted with work.

■Multi-business development is the source of growth

Our company currently operates over 60 businesses. Our business activities are wide-ranging, from WEB3 and the Metaverse to agriculture, and we are taking on any business that evokes the future. You might be thinking, "If we just focus on our existing businesses, there's no need to expand so much," but it's like a top athlete. They take on many challenges to succeed, and they need to change every day to stay at the top. The same is true for companies. There is a limit to the growth that can be achieved from a single business, and to seek greater change, they must continue to challenge themselves in new areas.
For this reason, we are expanding our business into various fields as a way of sowing seeds for the future. There is no such thing as maintaining the status quo at our company. Compared to other companies, our company is characterized by its speed, including the speed of decision-making, and there is an exciting feeling of new things being born one after another.
Additionally, one of the major trends in the IT industry today is a shift from platform providers to publishers. For example, I believe that the video streaming services you use every day have original content in addition to content produced by other companies. In other words, while traditionally platforms served solely as a distribution platform, purchasing various content from businesses and delivering it to user members, in recent years there has been an increase in in-house content production. In response to this trend, we would like to fulfill our role as a publisher and further differentiate ourselves from other companies. In fact, our company has been involved in a wide range of anime productions for many years, and we plan to focus on content production in the future while utilizing the know-how of our existing business.

＊message＊

As the job hunting season approaches, many students will start thinking about what kind of company they want to work for. However, in reality, which company you join is just a means to an end.
What you should be thinking about is what you want to do. However, I think that very few people can give a clear answer as to what they want to do in the future. That's why I want you to keep thinking about fun things and keep doing the things you love.
If you face your feelings of "fun" and "like," you will gradually begin to see what you want to do. Try to delve into your own emotions so that joining a company is not your goal.

Student Newspaper April 1, 2022 Issue Keio University 10rd Year Student Miyu Ito