We recently had the honor and pleasure of hosting five Senior Analysts from the Information Technology Research Department of Nomura Research Institute (NRI). NRI is a Tokyo-based technology consulting firm with over 6,200 emloyees around the world. They were visiting various organizations across the United States doing reserach on new technologies. We were the first stop on their tour.
Along with other topics, they mainly were here to talk to us about Mariner360, our newest online offering powered by Geezeo. According to our guests, there is not any type of Personal Financial Management (PFM) software available to Japanese consumers today. They are interested in offering this type of system to them.
They did note one signficant difference between the Japanese and American consumer. Their consumers do not typically have credit cards or carry the associated balances, unlike many American consumers today. So their consumers desire to aggregate their accounts is less important than the budgeting and goal setting tools available in the PFM.