Q: How long have you been involved with The Open Group?
In January of 1998, my company, ReGIS (Research Environment of Global Information Society) Inc., a global research and consulting firm, joined The Open Group as a gold member.  At that time, I started working for The Open Group as the Representative Director, Chairman of The Open Group Japan, leading all activities related to The Open Group in Japan including building relationships with academia, media, government and research organizations, membership programs and, most importantly, promoting the value of open standards certification and proactively promoting The Open Group brand.

As part of my role, I am also the advisor to Allen Brown, CEO of The Open Group, and was given the honorable title of The Open Group Ambassador in 2008.

Q: Why did you become a member and what does your involvement look like?
I primarily became a member because as a global IT consultant, I realize that global open standards are at the core of my business.

Q: How has membership in The Open Group benefited you, your organization and the industry at large?
On a personal level, I’ve learned a lot about different views on IT issues from a global user perspective and also how vendors approach open solution product design from attending The Open Group conferences. At the events, I’ve also learned a lot about all aspects of IT architectures, security and real-time embedded systems.

On behalf of ReGIS, I am able to provide more strategic leadership to my clients based on what I’ve learned from my Open Group membership.

With regard to the IT industry at large, The Open Group leads the industry in driving optimization of IT ownership cost and effective usage for end users.

Q: What contributions to The Open Group are you most proud of?
I am proud of my never giving up my fighting spirit!

Twelve years ago, The Open Group only had seven local hardware vendors plus a few end-user organizations as members. In accordance to the software and service direction of The Open Group, I introduced end user organizations, IT solution vendors, academy and government organization such as IPA, Kyoto University, Kyushu University, Aoyama university, NTT, Mitsubishi (IT Solution), Toyota, Nissan, and NRI among others, to The Open Group – significantly grow our Japanese membership numbers.

Just a year ago, there were no Japanese members with prestigious platinum memberships, but with my help Fujitsu Global Solutions Unit decided to join as gold member. I was also able to influence the Japanese automobile industry and get Toyota and Nissan to join The Open Group. What’s most impressive is that this activity took place against the heavy wave of economic stagnation that resulted in the lowest growth rate for the Japanese economy in 20 years.

These days, I’m investing more resources in raising awareness on the importance of open IT skills for enterprise architecture and shifting strategies from B2B to B2C and waiting for springtime to return to our economy.
 
My motto is to never give up if you believe there is value to your efforts.

Q: Why is it important for other organizations to join The Open Group?
By joining The Open Group, you can learn how market leaders - even your competitors - are being successful without asking confidential questions.

Q: What are your hobbies?
In my free time I enjoy teaching enterprise architecture to students at a university, playing "go" and golf.

Q: What book are you currently reading?
Arthur Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation.

Q: Any last thoughts?
From around 500 BC to 480 BC, Greek philosophers, the Indian Buddha, and the Chinese Lao Tsu, Confucius, were all discussing the same philosophical points on the architecture of existence and nothingness with causes – but in geographic isolation.

Why did they all discuss the same topics and how has the discussion endured over time?  

Philosophy is to find happiness for human beings. Nowadays, we are living in the most convenient Internet-era with instant global communications which allows The Open Group to discuss enterprise architecture in open ways on a global scale. We should consider ourselves very fortunate for this.

Enterprise architecture is a philosophy and set of practices that make organizations, and in turn society, happy. The questions that remain are if philosophy achieved its goal?  For how many years has philosophy been discussed? And in how many years can we discuss architecture?

About Jack Fujieda

Junkyo (Jack) Fujieda, the founder and CEO of ReGIS (Research Environment of Global Information Society) Inc., a global research and consulting firm, leads all activities related to The Open Group in Japan. Since 1998, Jack has covered academia, media, government research relationships, membership programs, and, most importantly, promoting the value of open standards certification, and proactively projecting The Open Group brand. Jack achieves this through technical forums that promote and educate executives about The Open Group’s activities. Japanese end-users and vendors benefit from these proactive activities, both in the Japanese forums and The Open Group’s global conferences and forums.

Prior to his involvement with The Open Group, Jack Fujieda worked for 23 years at IBM, as systems engineer, product manager, SE manager, sales manager, branch manager, and director of the complex systems division, covering finance, transportation, media, public sectors, distribution and retail industry in the field. Half of Jack’s IBM career was in systems and as industry marketing director at IBM's Japan headquarters

After IBM, Jack joined CSK as Board member and launched the first commercial UNIX® in Japan in 1985. And, as SVP of CSK group, he sponsored DCE and joined The Open Group as a member.

Jack Fujieda holds a Bachelor of Art degree from Kyoto University. He is a certified TOGAF architect and also lectures on open systems and IT venture management as visiting professor at Kyoto University, the Graduate School of Shinshu University, and Tokyo Denki University. Jack is also the president of CRM Association in Japan.