Client Interview – Mr. Hiroki Oki, Nohara Holdings Inc.

Our company Relipa have opportunity to receive a request to develop a housing exhibition site search site called “in Town” from Mr. Hiroki Oki of Nohara Sangyo Co., Ltd. (Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo), a subsidiary of Nohara Holdings Inc..

We interviewed Mr. Hiroki Oki about his impressions through the project with Relipa and what he expects from Relipa in the future.

“With the new information site, I would like to ask Relipa to built-in VR images into the site.”

Good morning, thank you for joining with us today. So, firstly, can you share a little bit about your working experience before Nohara?

I had been a web director for a long time in Japan. After that, I started thinking about doing consulting and planning strategy, and started to do upstream development, and now I’m also a service designer.

Could you briefly tell us about your company’s services?

Among architecture, we are a building material trading company that purchases building materials mainly used for interior construction and wholesales them to building contractors and general contractors.

Relipa really appreciated your request in the project “in TOWN”. Could you tell me more about this project?

Since I run a building material trading company, I was just about to launch an information providing platform that customers can refer to when building a new custom house.

The business of building custom homes with a building material trading company is not directly related, but we decided to expand it in the form of a derivative business. Nohara originally developed a number of distant (not strongly related) businesses, and this was started as part of those.

When building a new custom-built house, we will provide a service that allows customers to view the model house in VR, as well as the information on the house maker, the information on the housing exhibition hall, and the model house information that accompanies it. I’m trying to spread it as a type of medium.

So you entrusted the development of the VR part to Relipa?

We asked Reripa to incorporate the VR information that the video shot by this employee can be seen on the web into the site.

Please tell us what inspired you to develop “in TOWN”.

Originally, Nohara was working on a VR-related business, and we decided to develop it as a tool to expand it.

“I was worried about offshore communication, but there were no problems at Relipa”

Have you every had any experience in using offshore development?

Before I joined Nohara, I had a few. I’ve chosen Vietnam as offshore and for nearshore, and I’ve been to Okinawa and Hokkaido a few times.

Were there any partners that left an impression on you in offshore development?

For me, the one that left the biggest impression on me was Relipa.

Did you have any concerns about offshore development?

Of course, I have to say that I did really worry about the language problem, and I wonder if I can convey my thoughts properly… Also, the quality of communication and the speed of response, since we are not nearly located…

Then, did you have any concerns in terms of the service quality?

The same thing can be said about quality in Japan, but in software development, you can’t know until you actually do it, so I wasn’t worried about poor quality because it was offshore development.

“There is nearly no quality problems, and the correction response is quick. We have high expectations for the future!”

Can I ask about your thoughts on the speed and quality of the service?

Indeed, as for the expected value for offshore development, compared to nearshore, major domestic vendors are very expensive, so naturally we also demand a certain level of quality. However, since offshore is cheaper, there was originally a preconceived notion that the quality would drop to some extent (compared to major vendors).

Under such circumstances, it is normal for some mistakes to occur along the way (even if it is not offshore). I had no complaints.

On the contrary, Relipa proceeded with the work properly, and the staff in charge had a strong attitude of making good products, and I was grateful that they made good suggestions many times. I was very happy.

Are there any points that you think Relipa should improve in the future?

I wondered whether I was not good at it or not, but when I saw the actual finished product, the margins and photo sizes were slightly different from the design I handed before. May be it was just my individual thoughts. So, after looking at it, I gave feedback such as “Please do this here” and made corrections, but I would be happy if the design could be reproduced smoothly as I asked from the beginning. That’s all I think.

When problems occured, were they properly fixed?

Yes. Relipa responded immediately.

There was a task that I had originally asked for, but in the middle of that, there was also a case where I gave priority to other work by inserting it and requesting it first. From the development side, who is in charge of version control, I think it’s really troublesome, but I was very grateful that they handled it properly.

How do you think Relipa can contribute to your company’s growth in the future?

This project was a little different from our main business of building materials, but I think that our employees have requested separate development for our main business, the “build-up business.”

I think that many sub-services will be created in the future in your main business, so if you can do it offshore and speedily like you did with “in TOWN”, I will have more opportunities to help you. I think so.

Personally, I think that Relipa’s work on this project was very good, so I hope that the main project, which I have separately requested, will also produce proper results.

“Offshore development is recommended because there are no particular problems even if it is remote done!”

Finally, do you have any message for the readers of this interview?

Due to the Corona crisis, remote communication is increasing even in Japan, and since it is possible to communicate through a personal computer regardless of the country, the thresh-old for offshore is lower than before, and I think it will be easier to introduce.

This time, we were able to have a meeting with Relipa members in Vietnam as if we were having an online meeting with people in the company, so it was easy to do, and there was no communication loss that I was worried about at first. did. The tools for communication that I presented to them were quickly accepted, so it went very well. I think that even those who have never done (offshore development) should give it a try.

Thank you very much for your valuable time today.