Addressing Social Issues in Logistics and Manufacturing by Combining Finance and Services: Launch of a New Service for Mobile Collaborative Robots

――To begin with, could you tell us about the background and circumstances that led you to focus on robotics-related businesses?

Okamura:
We provide a wide range of equipment to customers in the logistics and manufacturing industries, which gives us the opportunity to see the issues they face on a daily basis. What we’ve learned is that many of our customers face the same serious issue: labor shortages caused by a declining birthrate and an aging population.
We felt that addressing this issue was an important priority, so we established the Robotics Business Development Department in 2025.
In addition, the mission of our department, Hitachi Sales Department No. 2, is to promote business co-creation with Hitachi and the Hitachi Group. We believed that combining our financing capabilities and customer channels with the advanced technological expertise of Hitachi Automation would enable us to contribute to addressing the labor shortage issue.

――Mr. Nakai, we understand that you were seconded to Hitachi. How did you utilize that experience in this project?

Nakai:
From April 2024, I spent two years on secondment to the company’s logistics and robotics promotion center, where I was involved in proposing robotics and automation solutions while visiting a wide range of logistics and manufacturing sites.
By listening firsthand to the people working at these sites, I came to realize that the labor shortage issue was even more serious than I had imagined. At the same time, I learned that although many customers were interested in robotics and automation, they were unable to move forward with implementation because they didn’t know how to select the equipment or robots best suited to their operations.
These experiences led me to consider whether we could help solve these challenges by combining the technological capabilities of the Hitachi Group with Mitsubishi HC Capital's expertise in structuring financing schemes.
Our department is constantly exploring solutions that are highly compatible with our business and can help address our customers' challenges together with our partners. In that context, we became convinced that Hitachi Automation’s mobile collaborative robot was a solution that many customers could readily adopt as a first step toward automation and began developing a concrete collaboration framework.

――What specific barriers do customers face when they consider automating their sites with robots?

Nakai:
Many customers considering robots tell us that they want to address labor shortages and improve operational efficiency. At the same time, however, they face several barriers.
One of the biggest barriers is the initial investment. In addition to the robots themselves, there’s also the necessary installation work and system configuration, which can drive up the investment substantially. Customers also frequently tell us that they find it difficult to determine whether the benefits will be sufficient.
In addition, under conventional leasing arrangements, implementation expenses are often handled separately from operation and maintenance expenses. As a result, customers have faced challenges in forecasting additional expenses and costs associated with responding to equipment failures down the line.

――So this collaborative service was developed to overcome those barriers?

Okamura:
Yes, the new service was designed to address these challenges.
In addition to the robot itself, the service packages installation, initial setup, and maintenance services, such as configuration changes and troubleshooting after implementation. The monthly fee model enables customers to confidently use the service while reducing their initial investment.
Hitachi Automation handles the installation, maintenance, and troubleshooting, while Mitsubishi HC Capital owns the equipment and is responsible for billing and insurance coverage. The key feature of the service is that it is packaged as a service that includes maintenance and is billed monthly for a standard five-year period.
Not only can customers consult with a single provider throughout the entire process, from selecting a robot to implementing, maintaining, and operating it; they can also more easily forecast future expenses because maintenance costs for the five-year period are included in the monthly fee along with the equipment cost.
Furthermore, the maintenance framework provided by Hitachi Automation helps reduce the risk of downtime in the event of a malfunction.
We believe that a major benefit of this service is its ability to address multiple barriers to robot adoption at once, such as not knowing which solution to choose, difficulty in assessing cost-effectiveness, and concerns about operation after implementation.
Through this service model, customers can approach automation not from the perspective of owning robots, but from the perspective of using the functions they need as a service.

――Could you tell us about the advantages of the mobile collaborative robot selected as the partner technology for this service?

Nakai:
The mobile collaborative robot developed by Hitachi Automation can work alongside people in the same space without safety fencing and helps improve the efficiency of tasks such as palletizing products and cargo and unloading goods from pallets.
The robot has three key strengths: recognition capability, mobility, and collaborative operation.
What is particularly noteworthy is its advanced 3D vision technology, which enables the robot to instantly recognize the position and shape of objects.
In today's workplaces, where product diversification and small-lot production are becoming increasingly common, one of the robot's greatest strengths is its ability to perform accurate picking operations without requiring master data to be registered in advance.

――What about its mobility and collaborative capabilities? It seems well suited for use in multi-tenant logistics facilities.

Nakai:
That's exactly right.
Conventional large-scale robots typically require anchoring to the floor and safety fencing. However, this robot is equipped with casters and doesn’t require fixed installation, making it easy to accommodate site relocations and layout changes.
In addition, because it is a collaborative robot that can operate in the same space as people, it can be introduced into existing facilities without the need for large-scale modifications.
In multi-tenant logistics facilities, which have become increasingly common in recent years, tenant turnover and layout changes are not uncommon. This robot can flexibly adapt to such changes in the operating environment.
Getting the robot to take over physically demanding, repetitive manual tasks helps improve safety and enables more effective allocation of human resources.
Another feature of the robot is that it doesn’t require individual customization, which lowers the barriers to implementation and makes it easier to introduce at a variety of sites.
As a result, its application is expected to extend beyond logistics facilities to a wide range of industries, including manufacturing.

Example use cases

Receiving

Depalletizing

Automates unloading operations to reduce truck drivers' workload

In-warehouse operations

Pallet transfer

Transfers goods from receiving pallets to dedicated in-warehouse pallets

Shipping

Palletizing

Stacks goods onto shipping pallets

――What has the response been like since the service was launched?

Takeda:
To coincide with the full-scale launch of the service, we have been promoting it through initiatives such as email distribution using marketing automation. Although the service was only recently launched, we have already received inquiries from multiple customers.
In particular, customers have shown strong interest in the ability to introduce robots while keeping initial investment costs low, as well as the fact that maintenance is included in the monthly fee. We have also received encouraging feedback from customers who are exploring ways to address labor shortages and reduce labor requirements.
By sharing this feedback across our sales departments and branches, we hope that more customers will utilize the service to advance automation and improve productivity at their sites.

――Finally, could you share your medium- to long-term vision for this project?

Okamura:
This service is only the first step in the broader vision we have in mind.
Traditionally, our role as a leasing company has been to provide assets and financing. Going forward, however, we believe that we must transform ourselves into a provider of high-value-added services.
There are limits to what a single solution can achieve in addressing the major social issue of labor shortages facing Japan. Looking ahead, we intend to further strengthen our collaboration with Hitachi and other companies within the Hitachi Group.
Our vision extends beyond the introduction of robots. We envision a future in which we not only deploy robots but also implement the processes before and after that and provide the digital infrastructure for entire factories and warehouses that integrates AI, IoT, and control systems.

Nakai:
Starting with solutions to on-site challenges, we ultimately hope to optimize entire industries.
Because this solution can be applied across a wide range of industries, we would like to leverage the data and insights gained through this initiative to develop future business models.

Okamura:
We believe that if we combine our expertise in asset management with the cutting-edge technologies of our partner companies, there will be no limit to the value we can provide.
Looking ahead, we are also considering the development of a sharing platform that would enable customers to access advanced automation equipment whenever they need it and in the amount they need.
We are supporting our customers' business growth while helping to build the next generation of sustainable social infrastructure. We believe this represents the true form of business co-creation that Mitsubishi HC Capital aims to achieve.