Intellectual Property

Intellectual property is an important management resource for the LY Corporation Group (the “Group”). By actively investing in and utilizing intellectual property, the Group will promote open innovation and contribute to solving social issues and sustainable development of an information technology society.

Intellectual Property Policy

LY Corporation (the “Company”) aims to promote sustainable innovation through the protection and utilization of intellectual property, in order to realize a richer and more convenient society leveraging information technology. The Company’s intellectual property portfolio functions as a certificate of safety and security, allowing users to confidently use services over the long term and offering business partners a secure environment for collaboration.

The Company encourages the advancement of personalization through machine learning and generative AI, inspiring the development of innovative interfaces and new services. With these technologies, the Company works to improve user experience and safeguard intuitive, user-friendly designs in various ways. Furthermore, the Company actively protects the brand to ensure that users and partners recognize the unique qualities of LY Corporation, contributing to the enhancement of its value and ensuring safe usage.

The Company supports the promotion of open innovation through partnerships both within and outside the Group by building and leveraging its intellectual property portfolio. By actively integrating new ideas and technologies, the Company aims to maximize its value through intellectual property, contributing to solving societal issues and the sustainable advancement of the information technology society.

Growth Strategy and Intellectual Properties of the LY Corporation Group

In addition to the Media Business and Commerce Business, the LY Corporation Group focuses on AI technology as the foundation for creating new value in each business. The Group also actively builds an intellectual property portfolio centered around patents, designs, and trademarks regarding technology, designs and brands, which are important management resources.

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1) AI Technology

Based on AI technology, the LY Corporation Group will implement AI in all of its diverse business domains, including Media, Commerce, and fintech, to realize unparalleled convenience and ease of use for each and every user.

Aiming to be a company that utilizes generative AI the most in Japan, the Company broadly introduces generative AI from internal operations to service delivery. As of the end of December 2024, there are 32 use cases in services, achieving significant reductions in work hours, increased revenue, and improved usability.

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Patent Portfolio

The Group focuses on building an intellectual property portfolio of patents and other assets related to the results of the use of AI technology.

Positioning Map in the AI Domain

Using the Patent Score, a positioning map* was created on the asset value of the AI-related patent portfolio possessed by the Group in Japan.

*Created by the Company using "Biz Cruncher" of Patent Result Co., Ltd. Patent Score is an indicator of the degree of attention being paid to each patent. The higher the Patent Score, the higher the patent is rated as having "a high degree of market attention." The vertical axis represents the overall strength of each company's patent assets, evaluated in terms of both quality and quantity, and the horizontal axis represents the individual strength of the most valuable patent in its portfolio. The size of the circle indicates the number of patents.

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Patent Registrations in the AI Domain (Cumulative Number of Registrations from 2022 to 2024) 

*Positioning Map in the AI Domain and the graph are created based on the published data from Japan Patent Office's "Report on the Application Status of AI-Related Inventions."

2) Media Business

The Media Business draws numerous users by providing a variety of media services essential to daily life, generating revenue through advertising. With a commitment to a user-first philosophy, the Company works diligently to provide the services needed at the right time. In addition, by fully utilizing the strength of the LY Corporation Group, i.e., its unique and diverse assets, the Group will provide new marketing solutions that no other competitors can provide. For example, the solutions will encompass not only the acquisition of new customers by capturing the awareness and interest of users but will also comprehensively support purchase as well as the retention of good customers. By leveraging group synergies to accumulate data related to payments using PayPay and CRM using the LINE app, the Group will provide solutions that encourage consumers to take actions such as making and repeating purchases, which will lead to customer retention.

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Patent Portfolio

The Group focuses on building an intellectual property portfolio of patents and other assets related to the results of the Group's growth strategy for the Media Business.

Positioning map in the Marketing solution Domain

Using the Patent Score, a positioning map was created on the asset value of the marketing-related patent portfolio possessed by the Group in Japan.

Patent Registrations in the Marketing Solution Domain (Cumulative Number of Registrations from 2022 to 2024) 

3) Commerce Business

The Commerce Business offers services related to e-commerce. The LY Corporation Group aims for a sustainable growth in revenue by connecting the three action points: LINE, Yahoo! JAPAN, and PayPay, whose user bases are among the largest in Japan, to promote the cross-use of Group services and to expand the Group ecosystem. Starting in FY2024, the Company will gradually update the LINE platform, incorporating various touchpoints within the LINE app that connect to the diverse services offered by LY Corporation, such as commerce and local services. This initiative aims to promote cross-use of services. In e-commerce, the Company will introduce a new Shopping tab within the LINE app to provide a shopping experience originating from LINE.

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Patent Portfolio

The Group focuses on building an intellectual property portfolio of patents and other assets related to the results of the Group's growth strategy for the Commerce Business.

Positioning map in the Commerce domain

Using the Patent Score, a positioning map was created on the asset value of the commerce-related patent portfolio possessed by the Group in Japan.

Patent Registrations in the Commerce Domain (Cumulative Number of Registrations from 2022 to 2024) 

Brand (Trademarks and Design)

The LY Corporation Group is actively building a trademark portfolio to protect the trust of users in the corporate brands of its group companies such as LY Corporation, ZOZO, and PayPay, and the service brands provided by each company, and to ensure the safe and secure use of its services.
The  Group also considers the design of UI/UX, etc., which is created based on its user-first management philosophy, to be an important element in building its brands. A design portfolio is also built to protect the trust that users place in the design of UI/UX, etc., and to ensure the safe and secure use of the Group's services.

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Developing an Environment That Creates Intellectual Property

In order to contribute to the development of an environment that fosters innovation, the LY Corporation Group has an invention incentive system to encourage the creation of outstanding ideas and designs, etc. It also works to create a place where engineers and designers can produce exceptional ideas, designs and other creations.

Initiatives Taken to Encourage Creations

The Group is actively involved in planning venues for generating ideas for new businesses/services and R&D, as well as events such as hackathons and ideathons, which are unique to the culture of the Internet industry. With an eye on the market and technology trends, the Company contributes to the creation of ideas that will bear fruit in the future, and works to turn those seeds into a portfolio of intellectual property rights at an early stage.

Creation Incentive System

In addition to using the employee invention system to provide financial incentives (based on the application and registration of patents, and their evaluation) for the creation of ideas and designs, etc., particularly outstanding ideas and designs are shared with the entire company.

Building a Safe and Secure Trading Environment (Measures against Products That Infringe Intellectual Property Rights)

In order to realize a safe and secure trading environment for users and rights holders, the LY Corporation Group works to prevent the distribution of products that infringe intellectual property rights.
From 2003, LY Corporation administers the Yahoo Japan Intellectual Property Rights Protection Program to promptly take measures, such as removing items that infringe on intellectual property rights based on notification from the rights holders. Together with rights holders and rights holders' associations, Yahoo Japan has founded the Council for Intellectual Property Protection on Internet (CIPP) in 2005, welcoming related government agencies as observers. The Guidelines for Prevention of the Distribution of Intellectual Property Rights Infringing Goods on the Internet have been formulated, under which rights holders and Internet operators join hands to prevent the distribution of infringing goods.
In addition to these initiatives, utilizing a proprietary supercomputer specialized for deep learning, Yahoo! JAPAN Auction has improved its infringement detection rate by introducing a counterfeit listing detection AI that detects counterfeit listings based on information learned from a vast amount of past transaction data. In this way, the Group will continue to realize a safe and secure trading environment through the use of data and AI technology.

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Promoting Open Innovation

OSS (Open-Source Software)

In order to contribute to the development of an information technology society, LY Corporation releases the results of its research and development and intellectual property generated within the Company to the public in the form of OSS to be used in a variety of situations.
The OSS that is released to the public is protected with patent rights and provided free of charge to users of the OSS. The LY Corporation Group believes that providing a safe and secure environment for using OSS contributes to the development of OSS, which in turn leads to the sustainable development of the Group's technology and service development environment.

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Introducing Intellectual Property Activities

Japan Patent Office "Intellectual Property Strategies That Lead Management Strategy to Success" (Former Yahoo Japan Corporation)

LY Corporation’s intellectual property activities to build a useful, safe, and sound internet ecosystem, in cooperation with customers and partners, are introduced.

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Received Intellectual Property Achievement Award 2021(Former Yahoo Japan Corporation)

In the Intellectual Property Achievement Awards 2021 hosted by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and Japan Patent Office, Yahoo Japan received the Award from Commissioner of Japan Patent Office in the category of "design-based management" for the first time. Yahoo Japan was recognized for its company-wide efforts to refine UI and UX with a "user-first" approach, from management down to the production floor, as well as its focus on building an intellectual property portfolio centered on patents, designs, and trademarks as proof of safety and security.

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