3690.T

• Strategic Transformation to AI Company

  • Renamed segments from Commerce Support / Marketing DX Support to Commerce AI / Marketing AI starting Q1 FY2026, with a full business and organizational model change to become an AI-focused application layer player.
  • The company positions itself in the AI application layer (above hardware and LLM platform layers), and identifies three core competitive advantages: proprietary data assets, AI integration capability, and existing customer touchpoints, which the company has built over 25 years of operations.
  • Updated mid-term plan VISION2027: shifted from prioritizing sales growth while investing within non-deficit limits to balancing steady sales growth and consistent profit generation; set a ROE target of 10% starting FY2026; maintains an active M&A strategy targeting companies that strengthen AI integration capability or support vertical integration in the commerce segment.

• Key Operational Milestones FY2025

  • Achieved 25 consecutive years of revenue growth; completed the shift to the Standard Market on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
  • Consolidated Ruby Group starting October 2024, which drove large revenue growth in the commerce segment; both Ruby Group and eCube turned profitable in Q3 FY2025.
  • Officially launched the new AI-integrated SaaS product AD EBiS Campaign Manager (Campaign Manager) after 3 years of development, entering the new marketing campaign management space.
  • Continued to expand enterprise-focused offerings for EC-CUBE, releasing new products including EC-CUBE Subscription and EC-CUBE BtoB.

• FY2026 Operational Priorities

  • Commerce AI: Leverage generative AI to accelerate product evolution of EC-CUBE Enterprise, reduce customization man-hours, target growth in the large enterprise EC market, and build a repeating growth cycle of lead generation → project acquisition → product improvement.
  • Marketing AI: Focus on awareness-building investment for Campaign Manager, which automates the end-to-end marketing workflow from problem identification to execution. Plans to develop both autonomous AI agents and Copilot-style AI assistants to transform marketing operational efficiency.

• Overall FY2026 (ended September 2026) guidance: Total revenue of 5.45 billion yen, +10.4% year-over-year; operating profit of 320 million yen, +15% year-over-year; ordinary profit of 310 million yen, +10.9% year-over-year, targeting double-digit growth in both revenue and profit.
• Segment guidance FY2026:
  • Commerce AI: Revenue +21.4% year-over-year; operating profit expected to increase ~20x year-over-year to 120 million yen, as full-year profit contribution from H2 FY2025 profitability flows through.
  • Marketing AI: Revenue +2.6% year-over-year; operating profit expected to decline year-over-year, due to planned awareness and market development investment for Campaign Manager, whose revenue contribution is not yet included in the forecast.
• The lower than expected profit growth relative to revenue growth is intentional, driven by planned strategic investment in Campaign Manager awareness and AI capability building for organizational transformation.
• Dividend guidance: Proposed full-year dividend of 8.0 yen per share, including a 1 yen commemorative dividend for the listing shift to the Standard Market, maintaining the company's DOE 2.5% policy; annual 1,000 yen digital gift shareholder benefit is maintained unchanged.

For FY2025 (ended September 2025):

1. Commerce Support Business (pre-renaming to Commerce AI):
   • Absolute revenue: Grew 2.5x year-over-year, contributed the majority of the 35.7% total revenue growth.
   • Operating profit: 6 million yen, flat year-over-year (down from 7 million yen prior year). After adding the consolidated Ruby Group from Q1 FY2025, the segment turned to net profit in H2 FY2025, with both Ruby Group and eCube achieving profit growth in H2.
2. Marketing DX Support Business (pre-renaming to Marketing AI):
   • Absolute revenue: Almost flat year-over-year, with core product AD EBiS growing 2.2% year-over-year. AD EBiS accounts for 75.3% of the segment's revenue, and 44% of total company revenue.
   • Operating profit: 272 million yen, up 80.6% year-over-year, driving all of the company's total operating profit growth.

• Impairment losses on two acquired subsidiaries (Ruby Group: 238 million yen; Topika: ~100 million yen) led to a net loss of 142 million yen for FY2025. The impairment was due to conservative accounting for potential customer churn uncertainty at Ruby Group, and slower than planned growth at Topika; both businesses continue to operate and target growth, with no planned exit.
  • Campaign Manager operates in a currently non-existent market, so there is high uncertainty around customer adoption and market creation, requiring significant upfront investment with no guarantee of returns.
  • Competitive entry into the new marketing campaign management space is expected in the future, which could pressure market share and margins.

Q: What unique AI-enabled services can only Irgulum develop, that competitors cannot? / A: Management says full general-purpose AI that replaces all human work is not yet available. The most accessible near-term AI opportunity is building AI into specific, defined business processes to automate routine work, which aligns with Irgulum's existing 25-year focus on commerce and marketing processes. Irgulum embeds AI agents and AI assistants into every step of these existing workflows, automating manual tasks like information collection, gap analysis, solution proposal, and asset creation, while leaving final high-stakes decisions to humans. This embedded approach to industry-specific workflows creates unique efficiency gains that generic AI tools cannot match.

Q: What are the unique competitive strengths of the new Campaign Manager product? / A: First, as the first mover in the entirely new marketing campaign management (MCM) market, Irgulum has a first-mover advantage. For future competition, Irgulum has five core strengths: an existing customer base of more than 1,000 companies from the core AD EBiS product, an established network of advertising agency partnerships, 20 years of accumulated organizational and product development expertise building marketing tools, existing high-quality marketing data from AD EBiS, and existing patented technology that protects the product's core functionality. These strengths give Irgulum a durable advantage to capture this new market.