ITOCHU Corporation (headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Yoshihisa Suzuki, President & COO; hereinafter “ITOCHU”) announced today that it has agreed to underwrite new shares issued through a third-party allotment by Dawex Systems, SAS (headquartered in Lyon, France; Fabrice Tocco, Laurent Lafaye, co-CEOs; hereinafter “Dawex”). ITOCHU aims to create synergies with partner companies including group companies regarding the leveraging of big data to support the domestic roll-out of the data exchange platform operated by Dawex.

The market for all data transactions, including in the IoT, marketing, and industrial domains, is seeing significant growth, with the market size worldwide expected to reach $500 billion worldwide in 2022 and $780 billion in 2025.^*1 In addition, it is estimated that revenue from data exchange will increase corporate earnings by 20% and improve corporate value by 25%.^*2 However, in 2017 the number of companies that provided data in Japan was approximately 110,000, significantly lower than in the United States (approximately 300,000) and the EU (approximately 280,000), and the growth rate remains low.^*3

In January 2017, Dawex developed and launched a data marketplace service that allows companies to source, monetize and exchange data. The following year, Dawex commenced OEM provision in the marketplace, enabling companies to exchange data with partners or subsidiaries in a privateenvironment. Today, Dawex Global Marketplaceis the world’s largest marketplace for data exchange, used by more than 7,000 companies and organizations in over 20 industries, including finance and insurance, construction, energy, logistics and transportation, retail, telecommunications, and tourism and hotels.

In addition to investing in Dawex, ITOCHU will leverage the ITOCHU Group network to support the Company’s expansion in Japan. In addition, ITOCHU will work on creating new businesses with partner companies that leverage and utilize all types of big data handled by ITOCHU, including retail, telecommunications, and finance and insurance.

As part of its mid-term management plan “Brand New Deal 2020,” ITOCHU is reinventing its business by improving the value chain in the personal consumption sector and leveraging new and next-generation technologies.

As for data, in September 2018, ITOCHU invested in WingArc1st Inc., which offers software and services to leverage big data. In December 2018, ITOCHU entered into a capital and business alliance with data marketing business Freakout Holdings, Inc. This latest investment and collaboration will enable ITOCHU to harness the extensive experience of Dawex in the data exchange marketplace to accelerate its next-generation business.

Dawex website: http://www.dawex.com/