Cinnamon has raised a total of approximately 1.5 billion yen through capital increase through third-party allotment with the main investors being funds managed by SBI Investment Co., Ltd. and Mirai Creation Fund managed by Sparks Group Co., Ltd., as well as a loan from Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation. We are pleased to inform you that we have completed fundraising.

■Funding overview

We have recently completed a third-party allotment capital increase as part of the Series B round, including the first close held at the end of May 2018, targeting the following investors. We also provided financing from Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation. The total amount of funding this time will be approximately 1.5 billion yen.

■Purpose of funding

With this funding, Cinnamon will strengthen its focus on the following points in order to realize a society that fundamentally improves white-collar productivity.

- Appointment of highly skilled human resources (especially highly specialized AI human resources overseas)

・By building a strong shareholder structure, we will improve Cinnamon's social credibility, strengthen our network, and accelerate growth.

・Strengthening the basic technology and user interface of AI products

・Strengthening the organizational structure to provide more advanced technology and detailed services (Japan, Vietnam, and Taiwan)

・Promote expansion into overseas markets (USA)

・R&D investment in new area development of artificial intelligence products (speech recognition, etc.)

■List of funding sources

◯FinTech Business Innovation Investment Limited Partnership (Unlimited partnership member: SBI Investment Co., Ltd. (Head office: 1-6-1 Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Representative Director: Katsuya Kawashima))

〇SBI Venture Investment Promotion Tax Investment Limited Partnership (Unlimited Partner: SBI Investment Co., Ltd. (Head Office: 1-6-1 Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Representative Director: Katsuya Kawashima))

◯FFG Venture Investment Limited Partnership No. 1 (Unlimited partnership member: FFG Venture Business Partners Co., Ltd. (Head office: 1-8-3 Otemon, Chuo-ku, Fukuoka City, Fukuoka Prefecture, Representative Director: Satoshi Fukuda))

◯ITOCHU Techno Solutions Co., Ltd. (Head office: 3-2-5 Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, President and CEO: Satoshi Kikuchi)

◯Sony Innovation Fund

◯TIS Co., Ltd. (Head office: 8-17-1 Nishi-Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, President and CEO: Toru Kuwano)

◯ Mirai Creation No. 2 Investment Business Limited Partnership (Unlimited Partner: Sparks Group Co., Ltd. (Head Office: 1-2-70 Konan, Minato-ku, Tokyo, President and Representative Director: Shuhei Abe))

◯Corporate venture capital fund (name: Nomura Incubation Investment Limited Partnership) of Nomura Holdings, Inc. (Head office: 1-9-1 Nihonbashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, Representative Executive Officer, President and Group CEO: Koji Nagai)

◯Sumitomo Corporation (Head office: 2-3-2 Otemachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Representative Director, President and Executive Officer, CEO: Masayuki Hyodo)

◯Next Generation Corporate Growth Support No. 1 Investment Limited Partnership (Unlimited Partner: SMBC Venture Capital Co., Ltd. (Head Office: 1-3-4 Yaesu, Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President and CEO: Tatsufumi Ishibashi))

〇Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (Head Office: 1-1-2 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, President and CEO: Makoto Takashima)

◯Koso Senbon (Renova Co., Ltd. Chairman and Representative Director)

◯Fujiyo Ishiguro (Representative Director, President and CEO, Netyear Group Co., Ltd.)

◯Others

■Comments from shareholders

Nomura Holdings Co., Ltd.

“After being selected for the VOYAGER accelerator program sponsored by Nomura Holdings, I was attracted to Cinnamon because they develop and deploy a full lineup of AI products that help improve productivity. We have established a scheme for acquiring and training excellent human resources in the AI field at our development base in Vietnam, and we feel there is even more potential for the future. We are looking forward to highly accurate AI products specific to business areas that cannot be achieved with general-purpose engines. ”

Sumitomo Corporation

“At Sumitomo Corporation, we support the early commercialization and growth of startup companies by combining them with the business assets of our own group, and we are also promoting the digital transformation (DX) of our group. We have highly evaluated the company's organizational structure, which has excellent AI engineers, and the technological superiority of its products.We will work with Cinnamon to further accelerate our group's DX and create next-generation new businesses. I'll figure it out."

■Future outlook

Going forward, Cinnamon will build a further foundation as an AI platform with the theme of "improving white-collar productivity" and will work on developing various products that promote business improvement. We will also promote collaboration with partner companies and expand sales of packages that improve accuracy in response to customer-specific requests. In addition, we will continue to expand our business not only in the Japanese domestic market, but also overseas.

[Cinnamon Co., Ltd. Company Profile]

Company name: Cinnamon Co., Ltd.

URL: https://www.cinnamon.is

Address: 6th floor, MTP Higashiazabu Building, 1-9-16 Higashiazabu, Minato-ku, Tokyo

Established: October 2016

Representative: Mirai Hirano, Representative Director and CEO

■Business content: Artificial intelligence product business, artificial intelligence consulting business

Cinnamon provides proprietary artificial intelligence engines centered on the AI OCR "Flax Scanner" that reads documents like a human, and has a track record of providing it to many major domestic companies. doing. We also have an artificial intelligence research institute in Vietnam and have succeeded in acquiring a large number of AI engineers.

Since introducing "Flax Scanner" in April 2017, we have had business negotiations with over 200 companies and have provided top-class technology in Japan in the AI OCR field.

In addition, through the artificial intelligence chatbot ``Scuro Bot'' and the recommendation engine ``Lapis Engine,'' we will respond to inquiries, set interview times, offer job offers at human resources companies, and contract rates for rental properties. We provide matching algorithms that enhance the

Furthermore, we recently pre-launched the development of specialized voice recognition technology "Rossa Voice" and have begun demonstration experiments.

■Overview of main product “Flax Scanner”

Most of the business documents used on a daily basis are unstructured and require human effort to incorporate into business systems, resulting in a lot of waste in white-collar work. Cinnamon uses an artificial intelligence document reading engine to fundamentally reform white-collar work. A variety of documents can be supported, including PDFs, Word files, and paper documents such as printed and handwritten documents. Currently, we provide engines to many major companies, including those in the financial and insurance industries.

【Features】

By enabling AI to understand various business documents and import them into a database, white-collar work efficiency will be drastically improved.

1) Can be read even if the format is unspecified

2) Handwritten character reading accuracy is 99.2% in research data and 95-98% in real data.

3) Automatic correction of read data by building a unique database

4) Compatible with both on-premises and cloud, and can be constructed according to the customer's security policy

■Cinnamon Co., Ltd. Major shareholder

[Recruitment information]
Cinnamon is actively recruiting employees.
Please click here for available positions and how to apply.
Recruitment page
https://cinnamon.is/recruiting/