Blending Japanese and Dutch values to build the most impactful health tech developer powerhouse
When Joris Janssen , Reuben Shaffer , Ronald Scheffer and I assumed leadership of OMRON Healthcare Global ‘s digital health efforts exactly 425 years after our countries first met (April 1600, image 👆), we embarked on a journey to unite Japanese and Dutch cultures in a shared vision: to build a developer powerhouse that redefines digital health innovation. By weaving the precision and harmony of Japanese values with the entrepreneurial agility and impact-driven mindset of Dutch values, our aim is to create a developer powerhouse that transforms lives. This is a place where autonomous, cross-functional teams flourish without traditional managers, harnessing modern tools and AI to craft code that carries deep purpose. In this edition of my weekly blog, I share our vision and belief how bringing together two cultures can shape the future of healthcare.
Japanese Values: Quality & Harmony
Kaizen (改善)
At the heart of our mission lies kaizen (改善)—the Japanese ethos of continuous improvement—and an unwavering commitment to quality. For nearly a century, OMRON Group has pioneered transformative technologies, such as the world’s first digital blood pressure monitor, guided by founder Kazuma Tateishi’s belief that societal progress must outweigh short-term profits. This legacy shapes an environment where teams are trusted to lead with expertise, their contributions valued, and their work driven by purpose to enhance lives through meaningful solutions.
Wa (和)
The principle of wa (和)—harmony—nurtures collaboration and respect, aligning diverse perspectives toward shared goals. By integrating modern tools and AI as a force multiplier, workflows are streamlined, and decision-making is enriched, resulting in solutions that are both technically robust and profoundly human. In this setting, code becomes a vehicle for reliability and trust, embodying quality as a non-negotiable standard that drives impact in healthcare.
Dutch Values: Impact Entrepreneurship & Agility
Impact Entrepreneurship
The Netherlands, a vibrant hub of global innovation, thrives on impact entrepreneurship—crafting bold, pragmatic solutions for societal good. This ethos resonates deeply with Omron’s mission to advance health worldwide and fuels our personal commitment to this journey. In dynamic tech ecosystems like Brainport Eindhoven, home to nearly 20% of Dutch R&D talent, and Amsterdam, a culture of measurable outcomes flourishes. Here, teams tackle complex healthcare challenges—from AI-driven diagnostics to scalable remote monitoring—creating solutions that directly improve lives.
Agility
Dutch agility, rooted in flat hierarchies and open collaboration, sparks rapid innovation. Drawing inspiration from Luscii—the digital health pioneer we founded, now a cornerstone of our global digital health efforts—our teams operate autonomously, free from traditional managers, and embrace a four-day workweek to honor work-life balance. Empowered to make decisions and experiment with tools like React, AWS, DynamoDB or Kotlin, they build secure, scalable systems in an agile environment where continuous improvement is the norm (for those interested, more about our tech stack here). Freedom and responsibility go hand in hand, as we often reflect: “The power to act when no one dictates the path.”
Dream2030: Uniting personal health & professional care
As described in our best-seller Green On, every mission starts with a clear goal, or dream as we tend to call it. For digital health, our belief is that we can (and need to) shift healthcare from reactive treatment to proactive prevention, a pursuit embodied in the “Going for Zero” vision of OMRON Healthcare —eliminating preventable health events. At the core of this ambition lies a digital health ecosystem designed to unite personal health tracking with professional care.
This ambition is reflected in the three pillars of our platform that strengthen each other in one truly unique digital health ecosystem.
OMRON Connect, a clinically trusted app for consumers that empowers users to collect, analyze, and share health data with AI-driven insights, replacing outdated logbooks with medical-grade clarity.
OMRON Connect Pro (also known as Luscii – an OMRON Healthcare service ) extends this to remote patient monitoring, enabling clinicians to detect issues early through seamless, secure platforms integrated with electronical medical records and systems doctors and nurses already use.
Meanwhile, OMRON Connect Create fosters an open ecosystem, empowering partners worldwide to innovate by leveraging Omron’s devices, data (with user consent) and smart Clinical Intelligence.
This is not just about building apps; it’s about creating a connected future where health insights save lives, one proactive step at a time.
Our Vision: A Fusion of Purpose & Innovation
In order to realise this dream, we need to expand our team based on our vision to forge an AI-supported, human-centric developer powerhouse that harmonizes cultural strengths:
- Quality & impact: Japanese precision crafts reliable, user-focused solutions, while Dutch entrepreneurship drives scalable, societal progress.
- Harmony & agility: The spirit of wa unites global teams in collaborative synergy, complemented by Dutch agility that accelerates innovative cycles.
- Purpose & technology: Modern tools and AI amplifies a human-centric ethos, enabling personalized health insights that transform lives.
Drawing inspiration from developer-driven cultures at Luscii, this ecosystem prioritizes autonomy, meaningful challenges, and lasting impact. Teams work with a modern tech stack—tackling complex problems such as seamless hospital system integration, ensuring >99.99% uptime, or harnessing AI for predictive health outcomes. Quality takes precedence over fleeting trends, with trust in expertise and resources for continuous growth shaping a flat, async-friendly structure. Reflecting Luscii’s Holacratic principles, clear roles and flexible workflows empower teams to innovate from anywhere, fostering a balance of freedom and responsibility while having a lot of fun in our life at Luscii.
A trusted TaKiBi (焚き火) culture where people can thrive
To succeed, we believe we must be the company where top digital talent wants to work—a place where innovation, purpose, and growth go hand in hand. Therefore we are investing in building an environment that attracts ambitious, talented people eager to make an impact. We believe culture is not an afterthought; it is the foundation of everything we do. We need a workplace where people grow—both professionally and personally. Work is not just a job; it is a platform for learning, success, and meaningful contribution. We use our We at Luscii employee handbook to make our culture explicit, living up to our values (fully transparent, so if you want to take a look to learn from feel free to do so on our public We at Luscii).
A Global Hub in the Netherlands
Rooted in Japan’s heritage, this journey finds a vibrant home in the Netherlands, a beacon of inclusive, innovation-driven spirit. We do have teams in the US, Japan and other geographies, and now we are putting a lot of efforts in scaling our cross-functional teams in the Netherlands. These are small, autonomous units with each 2-5 developers, UI/UX designer, and a product owner—guided by Luscii’s “Team of Teams” model. Each team focuses on distinct platform components, from OMRON Connect’s AI-driven insights to Connect Pro’s clinical integrations, adopting best-in-class digital tools and AI, and work asynchronously to reduce unnecessary meetings.
In the spirit of Gemba (現場)—observing the real place where care unfolds—teams engage directly with hospitals, doctors, and patients, weaving their insights into solutions that resonate deeply. A “club house” in Utrecht serves as a gathering point, where monthly Assemblii events foster connection among a team representing over 20 nationalities, united by a shared mission.