日本語 
Leaner Technologies Co., Ltd., whose mission is to “continuously reinvent procurement standards,” will begin offering “Leaner Connect,” a next-generation platform that centralizes and automates information management and communication with suppliers.
This service digitizes the often opaque interactions with suppliers in manufacturing, automating data collection, management, and analysis. This reduces the workload on procurement departments, which are rapidly increasing in response to the Fair Trade Practices Act coming into effect in January 2026, carbon neutrality, and business continuity planning (BCP) measures. It supports improved profitability for manufacturers and a shift towards “strategic procurement.” This project, in collaboration with partner companies including Subaru Corporation, is promoting the optimization of “collaboration areas” in procurement operations.
Background and purpose of service provision
Japan’s inter-company trading market boasts a size of approximately 1,000 trillion yen, but the situation on the ground is critical. Japanese manufacturing is facing a survival crisis: “there will be no one left to run the factory floor.” The procurement department, the heart of Japanese manufacturing, is now facing two conflicting and enormous pressures, pushing its traditional “manual-dependent management” to its physical limits.
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Furthermore, the tools used in procurement departments promoting digital transformation are mostly limited to “improving work efficiency” by replacing paper and fax with digital tools (Excel and SaaS). As a result, the labor itself—”someone entering data, checking it, and sending emails”—remains to humans.
SOURCE: PRTimes
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