Meet Our Team

• #FSOC
• #HAPS
• #Quantum Technology

Makoto Inai

• Profile
  Joined SoftBank mid-career in 2007, and immediately after joining the company, He worked on introducing core backhaul networks, reinforcing backhaul lines in order to cope with the rapid increase in traffic in the smartphone era.
  
  After that, in addition to core backhaul work, he also worked on access backhaul work, and worked on introducing entrance radios used in areas where optical fibers were depleted, focusing on improving base station radio waves.
  
  Meanwhile, when ”The 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku Earthquake” occurred, he used his knowledge of entrance radios to lead a team in restoring base stations in the disaster area. Afterwards, he led and completed a backup project, drawing on his experience from the earthquake, to build a network that would be difficult to disconnect from important locations.
  In addition, after SoftBank acquired Sprint in 2013, he led the team to improve Sprint's network by leveraging his knowledge of entrance radio at SoftBank to improve the network and significantly reduce costs.
  After that, after leading projects such as building an ultra-low latency network for AI trading, he moved to the Advanced Technology Development Headquarters (currently the Advanced Technology Research Institute) in 2018.
  
  At the Advanced Technology Development Headquarters, he was engaged in the development of Payload for the HAPS business, and after entering into a partnership with Loon, a subsidiary of Alphabet in the United States, announced in February 2020, he led the joint development of Paylaod, and in September 2020, he made the world's first stratospheric flight. Successful LTE communication inside.
  Now that it has become an advanced technology research institute, the HAPS system is involved in research and development of Phased Array Antenna used in Feederlink, and the terrestrial system is involved in research on optical wireless communications, as well as next-generation encryption technology such as Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC). He is also engaged in research on Quantum Key Distribution (QKD).
• Research area
  • Post-Quantum Cryptography(PQC)
  • Quantum Key Distribution(QKD)
  • FSOC
  • Phased Array Antenna
  • HAPS
• Major achievements
  PQC
  

  • SoftBank Corp. and Sandbox AQ to Jointly Implement Next-Generation Cryptosystem Resilient to Cyber Attacks from Quantum Computers
  • SoftBank Corp. and SandboxAQ Jointly Verify Hybrid Mode Quantum-safe Technology ( Softbank Corp. , SoftBank Research Institute of Advanced Technology )