Super Studio

About Super Studio

Established on December 24, 2014, SUPER STUDIO Inc. operates as a key player in Japan's e-commerce and Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) sectors. The company was co-founded by Yushin Hayashi (CEO) and Koji Hanatani (COO), who were middle school classmates. Hayashi, with a background in web marketing and a desire to create his own products, teamed up with Hanatani, who brought his experience as a systems engineer from a major SIer. This combination of marketing and technical expertise formed the foundation of the company, which also includes co-founders Shinichi Mori (CTO) and another director, who shared the vision of creating a company that properly rewards individual achievement over seniority.

SUPER STUDIO's core business revolves around its integrated commerce platform, "ecforce," a SaaS solution designed for D2C businesses ranging from startups to large enterprises. The platform provides a comprehensive suite of tools to build and manage online stores, covering everything from sales channels and data management to analysis and marketing automation. Revenue is generated through this SaaS offering and through D2C consulting services. A unique aspect of their business model is that SUPER STUDIO operates its own D2C brands across various sectors like apparel, food, and home care. This hands-on experience allows them to act as their own first customer, identifying system challenges and gleaning practical know-how that is then fed back into the development of ecforce, ensuring the platform meets the real-world needs of its clients.

The "ecforce" platform is a robust ecosystem of products. It includes tools like "ecforce efo" for chat-based order forms to improve conversion rates, "ecforce chat" for automated customer service, and "ecforce ma" for marketing automation. More recent additions include "ecforce bi," a business intelligence dashboard for data visualization and analysis, and "ecforce cdp," a customer data platform that integrates online and offline data to create a unified view of the customer. The company is also expanding into offline retail solutions through a partnership with Mitsui Fudosan, aiming to bridge the gap between e-commerce and physical stores. Having secured significant funding, with a cumulative total of approximately 10.1 billion yen as of May 2025, SUPER STUDIO is focused on enhancing its products and accelerating customer acquisition to support its goal of increasing Japan's e-commerce adoption rate.