With the imaginative and prescient of making “a world the place each misplaced merchandise is discovered,” Discover Inc. runs “discover,” a cloud-based lost-and-found service powered by proprietary AI expertise. First launched by Keio Company in 2023, the service is now utilized by 33 corporations nationwide. We spoke with Wada Ryu, Director and COO of Discover Inc., about how expertise is reworking the way forward for misplaced objects.
An concept sparked by a misplaced merchandise
Discover Inc. is a Tokyo-based startup that gives a cloud service devoted to misplaced objects. The corporate was based in December 2021 by Consultant Director Takashima Akira and COO Wada Ryu.
“We had been discussing beginning a enterprise collectively when Takashima misplaced one thing on a enterprise journey. That have revealed many challenges associated to misplaced objects and impressed us to create a service centered on addressing them. That grew to become the place to begin for discover,” Wada recollects.
Partnering with Keio to scale up
As Takashima and Wada appeared for tactics to show their concept right into a viable enterprise, they discovered a accomplice in Keio Company. The operator of the Keio Line and Inokashira Line in western Tokyo, Keio manages 69 stations and fields round 500 misplaced objects inquiries every day. To deal with this workload, 10 to 14 workers members are frequently assigned to lost-and-found operations.
“We got a glance behind the scenes at Keio Company, and we have been struck by simply how demanding the work was for the workers,” Wada recollects. “What left the strongest impression was the way in which they handled every misplaced merchandise with such care, all the time pondering of the shopper. That have made me understand the size of the problem, and it was the place to begin for proposing discover as an answer.”
In October 2022, Discover Inc. was chosen for the Keio Open Innovation Program, Keio Company’s initiative to co-create worth with exterior companions. A proof-of-concept (PoC) trial commenced in February 2023, and by Could, the service had been formally adopted. Wada recollects spending the trial interval on-site on daily basis, listening to workers suggestions and feeding it again into the product. By means of this collaboration with Keio, discover advanced right into a misplaced objects service designed to fulfill on-the-ground wants.
From managing misplaced objects to discovering it with AI
The largest power of discover is its use of AI to streamline the method. Standard methods required workers to enter each element of a misplaced merchandise manually, however with discover, all it takes is a photograph. The AI mechanically analyzes options similar to coloration, form, and measurement, and registers the data along with the picture.
“For umbrellas, as an example, workers used to kind in each element—from the colour and sample of the material to the form of the deal with and even indicators of damage. Registering a single misplaced merchandise may take round ten minutes. With discover, it is executed in about one. Since railway corporations register over 10,000 misplaced objects a month, saving 9 minutes per entry provides as much as an enormous effectivity achieve and a serious profit for the enterprise.”
Not like standard methods that centered primarily on managing misplaced objects, discover is designed with the objective of returning objects to their house owners.
With discover’s database supporting picture searches, even easy wallets or equipment that have been as soon as laborious to establish by means of textual content alone can now be matched. All communication with house owners takes place by means of a devoted chat system known as “discover chat,” which makes it simpler to inquire at any time than by cellphone—drastically enhancing consumer comfort.
Throughout the PoC trial with Keio Company, introducing discover reduce misplaced objects inquiries by cellphone and at station counters by about one-third, whereas the speed of returned objects practically tripled.
Making Tokyo a metropolis the place each misplaced merchandise is discovered
Tokyo is house to about 14 million individuals. Moreover, greater than 500 million guests from Japan and overseas go to town every year, making it the placement with the very best variety of misplaced objects incidents within the nation. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Division reviews that in 2024, a document 4.4 million misplaced objects have been turned in to police stations throughout town. That determine doesn’t embrace objects discovered and returned inside corporations or amenities earlier than they ever attain the police, which means the precise whole is even greater. Wada’s objective is to carry discover’s mission—”a world the place each misplaced merchandise is discovered”—to life throughout Tokyo first.
“discover is already in use with main transportation operators in Tokyo, however our imaginative and prescient is a world the place each misplaced merchandise will be discovered—whether or not it is left in a restaurant or dropped on the road. To make that doable, working carefully with the police and native governments is important.”
discover’s instruments are already being utilized in some police stations to assist handle misplaced objects. The following step is to broaden that collaboration and create a citywide misplaced objects service for Tokyo.
“First, we need to make it doable right here in Tokyo, the place we have been born and raised, to seek out something that is misplaced, irrespective of the place or what it’s, by means of discover. If we will obtain that, it could possibly turn into a mannequin for increasing throughout Japan and abroad.”
After its rollout at Keio Company, discover has expanded to move infrastructure throughout Tokyo, together with Tokyo Monorail and amenities round Tokyo Worldwide Airport (Haneda). And in April 2026, Japan’s largest railway firm, JR East, is about to undertake the system as properly.
In March 2025, Keio Company obtained the Prime Minister’s Award, the highest prize on the authorities’s Digi-den Koshien program selling the Imaginative and prescient for a Digital Backyard Metropolis Nation. In June, the Bureau of Transportation, Tokyo Metropolitan Authorities（TMG), which additionally makes use of discover, obtained the Tokyo Good Service Award on the TMG’s DX Awards 2025. Each honors spotlight the popularity these organizations are incomes for advancing digital transformation within the area of misplaced objects.
Taking Japan’s lost-and-found tradition world
With inbound tourism on the rise, discover is increasing its multilingual help. The service now affords Japanese, English, Chinese language, and Korean, with plans to cowl greater than 100 languages sooner or later.
As a part of its new service initiatives, discover launched a PoC trial of discover Reuse in February 2025, operating by means of the top of August. This system takes unclaimed misplaced objects which have handed the legally required holding interval and would in any other case be discarded, and sells them on the net market Mercari Retailers, operated by Mercari, Inc. Along with contributing to the SDGs, the initiative returns proceeds to collaborating corporations, serving to to offset the prices of managing misplaced objects.
A world the place each misplaced merchandise is discovered relies on individuals taking the straightforward step of handing in what they choose up. By sharing Japan’s tradition of treating misplaced objects with care, discover hopes to unfold that spirit worldwide and assist make such a world a actuality. Appearing as a bridge of belief and reassurance, discover will proceed to develop from its base in Tokyo whereas increasing its community.
