Staffbase, headquartered in Germany, announced on the 11th that it will enter the Japanese market. The company was founded in 2014 and has customers in 47 countries around the world, including Germany. The company decided to enter the Japanese market after a Japanese company joined its customer base in November 2024. In the future, the company plans to hire staff for the Japanese corporation, such as a country manager, and establish a Japanese corporation.
The company’s solution allows information to be sent to field staff who have been missed from internal information transmission until now . Founder and CEO Martin Behringer explained, “Field staff working in manufacturing and other industries are often not provided with smartphones or email addresses by their companies, and paper is still the means of information transmission. We install corporate apps on personal smartphones and realize digital information transmission.” The company says it expects to gain customers in the Japanese market, which has a large manufacturing industry, just like Germany. Staffbase initially started by providing an employee app for smartphones. “The core of the app is the employee app. Companies can create their own original apps, and field staff can download them from the app store just like their personal apps,” said CEO of Behringer. The app that field staff downloads is the app of the company they work for. If they work for Company A, they download the app of Company A from the app store, and if they work for Company B, they download the app of Company B from the app store and start using it. The content is also tailored to the information of the company.
Currently, in addition to smartphone apps, the company provides intranets, SMS, digital signage, email, etc., and through a partnership with Microsoft, the information transmission channel is expanding to Microsoft 365. In Japan, there are products such as “LINE WORKS” by LINE WORKS and “direct” by L is B as communication solutions for field staff. When asked to compare the company’s products with these competing products, CEO Behringer explained, “I understand that there are existing Japanese products, but after researching, I decided that there are no other apps that work well for non-desk workers. I think that our biggest rival is ‘paper.'” “Paper has the advantage that anyone can use it and it is easy to distribute.
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However, it also has problems. To give a specific example, Siemens publishes a magazine with company information for employees in seven languages, but because it goes through translation and printing, by the time the booklet reaches all employees, the information is completely out of date,” said CEO Boehringer. That’s why Staffbase has equipped its app with an automatic translation function. Even if the content is not in the employee’s own language, the information is made available in a translated state. As there is a lot of manufacturing in Germany, the company has gained many users in industries such as automobiles, manufacturing, and healthcare. “Our customers have common challenges.
Looking at the trends of companies that have introduced the system, they are large multinational companies with multiple offices that handle customer service. This challenge is also our business opportunity, and I think that the Japanese market has common challenges. This is because we hear that many people work on-site and are suffering from information gaps. All the necessary information is stored in the PCs at headquarters, but it does not reach the field staff. The problem is that the necessary information is not reaching the field staff who are in charge of manufacturing and dealing with customers,” said Neil Morrison, Chief People Officer. When introducing the product, the company not only provides the product but also provides support such as consulting necessary for introduction and supports the transition to digitalization. The names of companies that have introduced the system are Adidas, Aldi, Coca Cola, DHL, Samsung , Toyota Finance Australia, and Volvo, and the company has about 3,000 customers, including companies that have not been disclosed. The first introduction to a Japanese company was decided in November 2024. Since then, PoCs have been ongoing at multiple companies. The product has already been translated into Japanese, and a sales agent is expected to be selected in March. The company is also preparing to hire new country managers and sales department managers.
SOURCE: Yahoo
