Kumanomics Joins Toranomon Hills Glass Rock as a Strategic Partner

Kumanomics Inc. (Headquarters: Setagaya-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director: Naoki Hashimoto) will join Glass Rock—a hub for cross-sector social problem-solving opened by Mori Building Co., Ltd. (Minato-ku, Tokyo; President and CEO: Shingo Tsuji) at Toranomon Hills in April 2025—as a strategic partner.

For the past year since the facility's opening, Kumanomics has served as a "co-creation coordinator," connecting stakeholders and fostering collaboration to address social issues. In addition to this role, the company will now strengthen its partnership to further revitalize the facility by driving strategic planning, developing new programs, and designing events.

◎ Background and Vision for Enhanced Collaboration from the Kumanomics Representative

I am sincerely grateful to have helped build this space as a co-creation coordinator over the year since Glass Rock opened.

This past year has confirmed one thing for me: solving social issues requires more than just excellent policy or groundbreaking business models; it requires a "place" and a "mechanism" where policy and business move in tandem. Glass Rock has both. Over the past year, I have witnessed firsthand the co-creation that emerges when government officials, business professionals, and practitioners sit at the same table, setting aside their sector-specific titles.

Kumanomics Inc. becoming a strategic partner adds a greater role to the foundation we cultivated as co-creation coordinators over the past year. It is intended to further enhance the value of Glass Rock—a rare co-creation hub in Japan that can move policy and business simultaneously across sector boundaries—and to co-create the strategy itself.

At the core of this is the "Social Innovation Sprint," which will launch in fiscal year 2026. This is a practical program that generates business by starting from social issues and bridging policy and business.

I created this by pouring in both the experience of conceptualizing social systems at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the skills to give them form honed at design school.

We are going to initiate changes to social systems themselves from Glass Rock. I feel a great sense of responsibility and joy in being able to stand on this new stage.

◎ Team Members

Kumanomics Inc. is composed of specialists in various fields, including the representative. We will contribute to the value creation and improvement of Glass Rock, a hub aiming to solve social issues through cross-sector co-creation.

Representative Director, Kumanomics Inc. / Nomad Policymaker Naoki Hashimoto Born in Hyogo Prefecture in 1986. After graduating from the University of Tokyo Faculty of Law, he joined the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) in 2010. He was the first national civil servant to study abroad at an art graduate school (Parsons School of Design, USA), completing an MFA. He has been involved in promoting design management, planning and operating "JAPAN+D" (which conducts policy formulation using design methods), and introducing service design methods at the Digital Agency. He also launched the Japan Patent Office's I-OPEN project, which solves social issues through intellectual property, and won the Good Design Award for the project in 2023. In 2024, he resigned from METI and founded Kumanomics. As a "Nomad Policymaker" who crosses organizational boundaries, he works on numerous projects where companies and government join hands to design business and policy as one. At Toranomon Hills Glass Rock, he serves as a co-creation coordinator, primarily in charge of co-creation design for policy and business. He also serves as a part-time lecturer at the University of Tokyo Graduate School of Public Policy.

Director: Public-Private Partnership, Community, and PR Ryuta Kosuge As a former "weekly bureaucrat" at METI, he served as the ministry's first community manager. He handles everything from planning and design to MCing, facilitation, and PR in a one-stop manner. He founded Grau Inc. in July 2025. He is an expert in revitalizing spaces for regional problem-solving. As a Toranomon Hills Glass Rock co-creation coordinator, he is primarily responsible for building partnerships with public partners (government). He is also a Tourism Ambassador for Tsumagoi Village, Gunma Prefecture.

Director: Strategic Planning Yosuke Kubota He has been involved in a wide range of work, from strategic planning for corporate branding to the utilization of intellectual property at a major retailer. He joined the design firm KESIKI in 2021. He has been involved in projects such as corporate culture transformation and business development. He founded con-syn Inc. in April 2025. At Glass Rock, he is in charge of overall strategic planning and the new "Social Innovation Sprint" program.

◎ What is "Social Innovation Sprint"?

Social Innovation Sprint is a five-session workshop program that launches business concepts by starting from social issues and combining "policy" and "business." The curriculum includes structural understanding of social trends, visualization of issues through systems thinking, and techniques for concept design that connects policy and business. Through five days of lectures, practical training, and cross-sector co-creation, participants aim to acquire the conceptual power to create new markets and engage in rule-making.

◎ Kumanomics Media Coverage (Reference)

▼ March 9, 2026: "Worker’s Resort" [Glass Rock] Interview with co-creation coordinator Mr. Hashimoto: The mechanisms of a space that creates the "sparks" of co-creation.

▼ November 28, 2025: "XU (Cross U)" YouTube, Dialogue with Atsushi Tamura "Saving a city with a population of 8,000 that is at risk of disappearing. The power of design as told by a former METI bureaucrat! What is the Good Design Award-winning thinking method and the 'design thinking' that saves regions?"

▼ November 5, 2025: "Nikkei" Electronic Edition (Morning edition, page 35, University) "Looking beyond precedent: Naoki Hashimoto, Representative Director of Kumanomics - Footsteps of Seniors: The Reformers"

▼ July 18, 2025: "Future Literacy Journal" Changing the future by "opening up policy" (Kumanomics Representative Naoki Hashimoto) #2040s Workstyle Series

◎ Inquiries regarding this article Kumanomics Inc. Public Relations (Midori Hashimoto / Kosuge) Web: https://kumanomics.jp MAIL: info@kumanomics.jp Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kumanomics/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kumanomics/ *On social media, we share Kumanomics' philosophy and activities through original illustrations. We look forward to your follows and likes!