Interview with Keita Nakamura - Mercari aims to respond to the needs of the gateway to Web 3.0 and increase cryptocurrency holders and users

What do you think about the current state of the Web 3.0 field?

Keita Nakamura (hereinafter, Nakamura): I think that Web 3.0 is currently in a transitional period where it is clearly penetrating society. Crypto assets and digital assets have created a big trend, but there is still a long way to go before they become mainstream. I feel that from the time when they were basically treated as financial assets mainly for speculation, attention is gradually being paid to their use cases and utility.

For example, there is a rise in the use of ownership and usage rights, and I think that games using blockchain technology have shifted from simply making money to being purely fun as a game. With the entry of major companies, the number of users will increase as the number of content with various utilities increases, which will drive the progress and penetration of the technology, so recent developments are very interesting and I am paying close attention to them.

When such Web 3.0 content spreads, infrastructure such as wallets, marketplaces, and exchanges will become increasingly important. It is important to be in a state where you can start immediately when you have content you want to do, and we want to be a gateway to Web 3.0.

Creating a situation where cryptocurrencies are used throughout Japan

What kind of appeal do you want to deliver through your projects and services, and what do you want to achieve?

Nakamura: I think what is required of us is to get as many people as possible interested in cryptocurrencies and Web 3.0 and take the first step. There are several elements to this, one of which is to increase the number of cryptocurrency holders and users.

We started with Bitcoin trading, and now we have made it possible to make payments and savings on Mercari, as well as to trade Ethereum. However, looking at the world, we are seeing scenes where cryptocurrencies are used by some overseas brands and payment providers, but we recognize that they have not yet become very popular. We want to change that from within Japan, and we want to create a situation where cryptocurrencies are being used all over Japan before we know it. We aim to create a world where the story of "buying pizza" that was popular in the early days of Bitcoin can become a reality in everyday life as we develop our business.

We also see spreading into the digital asset field as one of our challenges. We are still in the early stages of deciding how we will develop it, but we have a strong desire to onboard people to the entrance of Web 3.0, and we would like to create opportunities and places for anyone to experience Web 3.0 in an easy and open way by using the "Mercari" platform.

Future outlook ▶︎
Creating opportunities to experience Web 3.0 that is open to everyone Creating scenes in which cryptocurrencies can be used from Japan

Profile

◉ Keita Nakamura

CEO of Mercoin Inc.

While in college, he worked as an intern at CyberAgent to launch a programming education service and at DeNA to introduce a sentiment analysis platform for video services. After that, he joined Mercari's research institute "R4D" as an intern. After joining the company as a new graduate in 2018, he worked as a blockchain engineer on the "mercariX" project that was being carried out within R4D. He then transferred to group company Merpay, where he was in charge of distributed ledger development, the AML SYSTEM team, and the new financial business (Credit Design) as a PM. He joined Mercoin in April 2021, and after serving as Director and CPO of the Product department, he has been in his current position since April 2023.