Senior Researcher,
Research & Development Group
DENSO IT Laboratory (ITLAB) is a laboratory established by DENSO. While maintaining independence and a high degree of freedom in research, its key role is to contribute research outcomes to DENSO headquarters. How, then, is research actually carried out? We spoke with Senior Researcher Koichiro Suzuki.
Currently, the research theme I am working on is technology for recognizing the external environment of vehicles used in automated driving. Specifically, this involves active sensing to detect the surroundings of a vehicle using millimeter-wave radar. At present, we are now able to identify the shape and size of detected objects and determine whether what surrounds our vehicle is another vehicle or a pedestrian.
In the area of external-environment sensing, I have accumulated more than twenty years of experience, so I often receive direct consultations and requests from DENSO. That said, research themes are never imposed on me. We discuss ideas back and forth, and I also propose the themes myself. Because DENSO and ITLAB share the ultimate goal of advancing mobility, the research themes selected are aligned with that goal.
When moving research forward in concrete terms, we first listen to requests from people in development groups at DENSO regarding what they want to develop next, or what issues they are currently facing.At times, the issues are still vague or not yet well organized.
This is where we first focus on problem framing. Will what we are about to try truly lead to solving the problem? It is important to pause and think carefully about this at the outset. What is the essential issue? What should we be researching? Through repeated discussions until both sides agree on the problem to be addressed, we work to bridge the gap between the perspectives of headquarters and our own.
What is needed to solve a problem is not necessarily cutting-edge technology. Making “being cutting-edge” the goal can be risky. For example, trying to apply a machine-learning paper directly to the real world will likely not work well. Rather than over-relying on machine learning, existing technologies may be more effective in solving real-world problems. For this reason, we do not fixate on being cutting-edge; instead, we aim to judge which technologies will be truly practical and effective from a broad perspective. And that is why we place such importance on problem framing.
The research outcomes we provide are transformed into various technologies, applied across a wide range of vehicle models, and contribute to improving vehicle safety. I find fulfillment in being able to contribute to social implementation in this way. There are opportunities to present our research results through papers or exhibitions at DENSO headquarters, but I personally place the greatest importance on direct presentations to the headquarters department that approached us with their requests. When a request comes in, I want to respond as fully as possible, and hearing a simple ‘thank you’ from the team is genuinely gratifying.
After graduating from university, I joined a major systems integrator and worked as a web developer. However, I gradually felt unfulfilled by days spent simply carrying out assigned tasks. Wanting to pursue a research career like I had during my graduate studies, I joined ITLAB. At the time, I wanted to do work where I could think through the whole process from start to finish. The reason I now place such importance on problem framing before beginning research is to keep that original motivation in mind. ITLAB offers an environment where researchers can pursue research until they are satisfied. That said, it would be a waste for research to end there. We are looking for people who want to run all the way to the goal of social implementation.
Where engineering curiosity
meets real-world impact
