The University of Tokyo Economic Consulting (UTEcon) and ITOKI CORPORATION develop new solution “Reserve Any” to solve meeting room shortage by using market design

The University of Tokyo Economic Consulting Inc. (Head office: Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo; CEO: Yosuke Kawaharata; hereinafter referred to as UTEcon) a provider of consulting services based on academic knowledge in economics, accounting, and business administration, and ITOKI CORPORATION (Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President: Koji Minato; hereafter “Itoki”) announce the development of “Reserve Any,” a next-generation meeting room reservation system, as a new solution to minimize inefficient use of meeting rooms and improve productivity of the entire organization while promoting behavioral change in office workers and achieving overall optimization.

The chronic shortage of meeting rooms in offices is an issue without fundamental solutions. In recent years, along with an expansion of hybrid meetings with remote participants after the pandemic and a prevalence of free-address, users who wish to set up spaces for web conferencing, concentrating, and blocking sounds in offices are further increasing.

Reserve Any,” developed by UTEcon in collaboration with Itoki, makes users aware of the price of meeting rooms through a ‘point reservation system’ for meeting rooms, thereby inducing optimal behavior for the organization as a whole and enabling the use of meeting rooms with higher priority given to the wishes of those who reserve rooms with higher levels of need. In addition, as a new style of reservation, “Omakase Reservation” automates the allocation of the most suitable location by simply entering the desired conditions, reducing the time and waste of conference room reservations. “Kodawari Reservation” allows users to specify the conference room.

UTEcon has developed a new “Resource Usage Value Maximization Algorithm” that leverages UTEcon’s academic knowledge of market design as the technology behind these new meeting room reservation mechanisms.

UTEcon will continue to utilize its academic achievements in economics and other fields to provide consulting services to private companies in the areas of pricing, marketing, and personnel assignments, as well as analysis that contributes to evidence-based policy making (EBPM).