Futaba Lab Group, SBI Group's DeFimans, NIPPON STEEL CORPORATION, Perplexity, and SMBC Nikko Securities Sign MoU for Joint Verification of Next-Generation Digital Asset Execution Infrastructure

Futaba Lab Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Tokyo, Representative Director: Goki Kato, hereinafter "Futaba Lab"), through its group's overseas business subsidiary ANDLAW FZCO (Headquarters: UAE, hereinafter "ANDLAW"), has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for joint verification of a next-generation execution infrastructure in the digital asset domain with SBI Group's DeFimans Inc., NIPPON STEEL CORPORATION (TSE Prime: 2327), Perplexity AI, Inc. (Headquarters: USA), and SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. (Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, TSE Prime: 8316). This announcement is made by the Futaba Lab Group, with Futaba Lab as the parent company.

This initiative will involve joint efforts to build a practical execution infrastructure for institutional and financial investors through multi-market price acquisition and integration, strategy verification across spot and derivatives, and AI-driven transaction analysis, hypothesis generation, and agent construction.

Background

In recent years, the digital asset market has seen rapid expansion with a diverse range of products and markets, including spot, derivatives, and on-chain assets. However, each of these markets is fragmented in terms of liquidity, price formation, connection methods, and execution environments, leaving limited infrastructure for efficiently evaluating and executing trading opportunities across multiple markets.

Furthermore, the digitalization of existing financial markets, such as ETFs, stablecoins, tokenized securities, commodities, and FX, is expected to accelerate. This increases the importance of next-generation execution infrastructure that spans both on-chain and off-chain environments.

Against this backdrop, the Futaba Lab Group has been promoting the development of new execution infrastructure that spans multiple markets and products, leveraging the cross-chain and cross-market technological foundation it has cultivated. This MoU aims to strengthen these efforts from the perspectives of finance, AI, system development, and market connectivity.

From right: Mr. Taishi Sato, Representative Director of DeFimans Inc.; Tomonori Adachi of ANDLAW FZCO; Goki Kato of ANDLAW FZCO; Mr. Jerry Ma, Vice President of Global Affairs and Deputy CTO of Perplexity AI, Inc.; Mr. Daisuke Isono, General Manager of the DeFi Technology Department of SMBC Nikko Securities Inc.; Ms. June Morita, Head of APAC of Perplexity AI, Inc.

Key Areas for Joint Verification in This Initiative

This initiative will focus on joint verification of the following key themes:

● Data Integration

・Acquisition and integration of price information across multiple markets

● Strategy Design and Analysis

・Verification of strategies across spot and derivatives

・Generation and verification support for trading hypotheses based on public information

● AI Utilization

・Use of LLM aggregators ・Construction of a verification platform using Perplexity Computer

● Infrastructure Development

・Technical verification of execution infrastructure for institutional and financial investors

Through these efforts, we will examine the technological foundation that facilitates easier selection of appropriate counterparties and trading conditions across multiple markets, aiming to build infrastructure capable of adapting to the future sophistication and diversification of the market.

Features of This Initiative

This initiative is characterized by its comprehensive joint verification, from strategy design to implementation, verification, and market connectivity, without being confined to a single market or product.

Traditionally, central exchanges, on-chain, cross-chain, spot, and derivatives have often been handled individually under different market structures and technical requirements, with limited cross-market integration.

The Futaba Lab Group has built an execution infrastructure with a cumulative order processing record exceeding 20 billion yen, leveraging the technical expertise gained through its actual operations.

Based on this infrastructure, this initiative aims to realize a next-generation execution infrastructure that spans central exchanges and on-chain environments, and comprehensively handles the prices, liquidity, and market characteristics of multiple products, including spot and derivatives.

Future Outlook

The Futaba Lab Group has already conducted internal verification for some functions and plans to proceed with technical verification and implementation studies in stages, with a view to production environments.

In the medium to long term, we aim to build cross-market execution infrastructure that extends beyond the digital asset market to encompass a broader range of financial markets, including ETFs, stablecoins, tokenized securities, FX, and commodities.

The Futaba Lab Group will continue to work with domestic and international partners to build next-generation infrastructure in the increasingly digitalized financial markets.

Comments from Each Company

Goki Kato, Representative, Futaba Lab Group

I am greatly encouraged to be able to launch this initiative with partners who represent their respective fields. By combining the knowledge from finance, systems, AI, and business development with the cross-chain and cross-market technological foundation that we have been developing, I believe we can build a more practical execution infrastructure. Through this initiative, we will strive to achieve transaction optimization across multiple markets and work towards "creating the foundation for new finance."

Taishi Sato, Representative Director, DeFimans Inc.

I am delighted to be able to participate in this initiative with such passionate partners. While the boundaries between existing financial markets and on-chain/off-chain environments are blurring, it is difficult to say that active transactions in existing financial markets, such as commodity and ETF derivatives trading, are being executed efficiently and across markets. I believe that "the essence of finance is arbitrage," and I will dedicate myself to producing results that can appropriately capture the distortions arising from the development of new markets and benefit from the opportunities they create.

Hiroshi Hasegawa, General Manager, Financial Business Engineering Division, Financial Solutions Business Headquarters, NIPPON STEEL CORPORATION

I am deeply honored to be at the forefront of financial innovation by joining forces with partners who are challenging advanced initiatives. As digital assets and RWA transactions expand, the importance of mechanisms that seamlessly connect on-chain and off-chain environments is growing daily. In increasingly diverse and complex financial markets, the realization of fair and efficient trading environments is an indispensable challenge for future market development. We will leverage our technological expertise cultivated through the development of infrastructure systems for the securities market and our track record in algorithm development to contribute to the development of the digital asset market during this period of significant transformation in financial markets.

Dmitry Shevelenko, CBO, Perplexity AI, Inc.

I am honored to participate in this initiative with Futaba Lab and partner companies possessing deep expertise in financial markets, systems, and digital asset infrastructure. Finance is an extremely important sector for Perplexity, and by providing our AI-powered information aggregation capabilities, we aim to support market participants in more accurately interpreting public information and contribute to the development of more practical and reliable infrastructure for the future of finance.

Daisuke Isono, General Manager, DeFi Technology Department, SMBC Nikko Securities Inc.

It is anticipated that in the coming years, all assets in the financial industry will be integrated on-chain, forming a large-scale RWA market. During this period of significant transformation in financial markets, contributing to the creation of price discovery functions in new markets is a crucial mission for us as financial intermediaries. We recognize this project as a meaningful challenge with great potential for this mission and intend to collaborate with the industry-wide expertise of each company.

Futaba Lab Group

The Futaba Lab Group, with Futaba Lab Co., Ltd. as its parent company, is advancing the development of execution infrastructure in the digital asset domain under a group structure that includes overseas business subsidiaries. We are promoting the implementation of next-generation execution infrastructure for institutional and financial investors through price integration and execution optimization across multiple markets and products, cross-chain collaboration, and the utilization of interoperability.

Representative: Goki Kato, President and Representative Director Location: Aoyama Marutake Bldg. 6F, 3-1-36 Minami-Aoyama, Minato-ku, Tokyo Business Activities: Development and provision of digital asset execution infrastructure, multi-market price acquisition and integration, design and verification of execution strategies, planning and development of related products utilizing cross-chain collaboration and interoperability.

DeFimans Inc.

DeFimans Inc. is a professional firm undertaking projects on a global scale. Focusing on supporting new businesses and Web3 initiatives in diverse domestic and international industries, particularly in finance, IT, and entertainment, we handle everything from strategy formulation to execution support. We also provide planning and strategy development for stablecoin utilization, as well as practical support for their issuance.

Representatives: Noriaki Ono, Taishi Sato, Representative Directors

Location: Toto Bldg. 9F, 5-1-4 Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo

Established: July 2022

Business Activities: Consulting support for tokenomics, DeFi, GameFi/blockchain games, overseas expansion, business strategy, new business development, blockchain social implementation, NFTs, dApps, DAOs, etc.; hands-on support for fundraising, capital policy, marketing, translation, etc.; operation of Messari JAPAN.

NIPPON STEEL CORPORATION

NSSOL has provided high-quality IT services to customers in a wide range of industries, including manufacturing, distribution/services, finance, telecommunications, and government, by leveraging its extensive business knowledge and advanced technical capabilities, from consulting to development, construction, and operation. In the "NSSOL VISION 2030," we aim to be a "Social Value Producer with Digital," proactively leading the resolution of social and corporate issues by creating value ourselves. We will continue to contribute broadly to the resolution of issues across society and industries.

Established: October 1, 1980

Location: Toranomon Hills Business Tower, 1-17-1 Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo

Representative: Kazuhiko Tamaki, President and Representative Director

Business Activities: Management and system consulting; planning, design, development, construction, operation, maintenance, and management of information systems; development, manufacturing, sales, and leasing of software and hardware for information systems; IT outsourcing services and other various services.

Perplexity AI, Inc.

Perplexity is an AI company that builds accurate AI-powered products and services. Founded in 2022, its mission is to "power the world's curiosity." The company is the developer of "Perplexity," an answer engine that responds to questions with inline citations (source attribution) based on reliable information sources and deep research. It also offers "Comet Browser," the first AI-native web browser equipped with the powerful AI agent "Comet Assistant." Furthermore, it is developing "Perplexity Computer," which enables "large-scale multi-model orchestration" of AI across tools, files, code generation, persistent memory, and the open web.

Representative: Co-founder / CEO Aravind Srinivas

Location: 115 Sansome St, Suite 900, San Francisco, CA 94104, USA

Main Business Activities: Provision of AI search and answer engines, research support, development and provision of business support platforms.

SMBC Nikko Securities Inc.

As a comprehensive securities company within the SMBC Group, we offer a wide range of financial services to domestic and international clients, with both retail and wholesale functions. In addition to asset management consulting, investment banking, and market-related services, we provide comprehensive financial functions that include IT/technology and quant domains.

Representative: Hideji Yoshioka, Director, President and CEO (Representative Director) Location: 1-5-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Business Activities: Type I Financial Instruments Business, Type II Financial Instruments Business, Investment Advisory and Agency Business, Investment Management Business, etc.

Related Links ・Futaba Lab Co., Ltd. Official Website https://www.futaba-lab.com/

・DeFimans Inc. Official Website

https://defimans.com/

・NIPPON STEEL CORPORATION Official Website https://www.nssol.nipponsteel.com/

・Perplexity AI, Inc. Official Website https://www.perplexity.ai/

・SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. Official Website https://www.smbcnikko.co.jp/