Become.com has announced that Masahiro Ueno, one of the leading figures in Japan's Internet industry, has joined Become Japan Corp.
"We are thrilled and honored that Masahiro Ueno has joined Become Japan as CEO," said Become.com Founder, Chairman and CTO Yeogirl Yun. "His deep knowledge and experience in building media and Internet companies will help drive our success in delivering Japan's most advanced shopping search service."
"As online shopping becomes an increasingly bigger part of daily life and commerce, Become Japan has the potential to be the most trusted source that Japanese consumers use for product research and comparison shopping. Its powerful technology is specifically designed to give relevant shopping searches and help people make more confident buying decisions. This is essential to continuing the rapid growth of e-Commerce in Japan," said Mr. Ueno. "I am excited by the opportunity to lead Become Japan and replicate the success they have achieved in the U.S."
"Having worked with Mr. Ueno at transcosmos and seeing how he continues to innovate and grow great companies, we are confident that Mr. Ueno will make Become Japan the leading shopping search service in the country," said Masataka Okuda, president and COO of transcosmos Inc.
Under Mr. Ueno's presidency, Overture. K.K., a subsidiary of Yahoo!, established Overture Japan's paid search service as the clear market leader. Prior to Overture, Mr. Ueno was the managing director of Digital Marketing at transcosmos during which time he established and built a department from scratch. Mr. Ueno also served as the president of Doubleclick Japan, the regional office of one of the world's leading Internet advertising corporations.
With more than 70 million Internet users, Japan is the world's second largest market for online shopping and advertising. The Japan Marketing Association estimated the market size at 340 billion yen in 2004 (about $2.9 billion). Become Japan will focus initially on product research and reviews using the company's patent pending AIR(TM) (Affinity Index Ranking) search technology. This technology produces highly relevant product information and reviews, eliminating extraneous and spam results that often frustrate consumers trying to make buying decisions. AIR delivers better results by combining sophisticated computer algorithms with human intelligence.
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