AnyMind Group [TSE:5027], a BPaaS company for marketing, e-commerce and digital transformation, has today announced that it has agreed to acquire all shares of
Sun Smile Inc, a Japan-based distributor and brand owner in the beauty and personal care sector. The acquisition, AnyMind Group’s 13th to date and seventh in Japan, will mark the company’s entry into offline retail and strengthen its ability to connect social media, e-commerce and nationwide store distribution through an AI-powered online-to-offline (O2O) model.
Founded in 1997, Sun Smile operates a business model that spans manufacturing, distribution and wholesale in the beauty and personal care category. The company develops its own brands, supports overseas brands entering the Japanese market and provides nationwide retail distribution through a network of partner retailers.
By integrating Sun Smile, AnyMind Group will extend its BPaaS capabilities beyond digital screens to include nationwide offline retail distribution. This enables the company to build a more connected business infrastructure, where social media, e-commerce and offline retail operate as a single, data-linked ecosystem for business growth.
Across APAC, consumer behavior in beauty and personal care has shifted. Product discovery increasingly begins on social media, continues on e-commerce and often concludes in physical retail stores. Social commerce platforms such as TikTok Shop have reinforced the role of digital channels in driving brand visibility, purchase intent and conversion.
To support enterprises through this shift, AnyMind Group has been strengthening its content and social commerce capabilities, including the
recent acquisition of NADESHIKO Beauty, a company that operates vertically focused short-form video media to stimulate early-stage demand.
Tokuya Tanaka, CEO of Sun Smile, said: “Our company has long focused on creating brand value and expanding in the cosmetics and beauty goods sector, leveraging our product planning capabilities and distribution network. In recent years, as brand building originating from SNS and e-commerce accelerates, we recognize the growing importance of providing consistent brand support across online and offline channels and operating businesses premised on data utilization. By joining AnyMind Group, we believe we can combine our cultivated strengths in distribution and planning with AnyMind’s capabilities in social marketing, e-commerce, and AI utilization to offer brand companies even more advanced support than before. Moving forward, we aim to accelerate the creation of new mechanisms supporting brand growth by combining both companies’ expertise and foundations, further evolving value creation within the Japanese market.”
On the acquisition, Kosuke Sogo, CEO and co-founder of AnyMind Group, said: “Consumer journeys in beauty and personal care no longer end at the screen; they move seamlessly from short-form video and social commerce into e-commerce and physical retail. Sun Smile’s nationwide distribution network and experience in brand building are a powerful complement to our BPaaS model. By integrating our data, AI and operations, we will help brands grow faster and more efficiently from discovery to purchase, whether that happens online, offline or both. We will continue to build a new-generation business infrastructure that enables brands to grow both domestically and globally.”
Through the integration of Sun Smile, AnyMind Group will extend its capabilities beyond digital screens, to include nationwide offline retail distribution. This enables the company to build a new generation business infrastructure where social media, e-commerce and offline retail operate as a single, data-connected ecosystem. This will enable:
- Cross-selling expansion, with Sun Smile’s supported brands gaining access to AnyMind Group’s full suite of marketing, creator commerce and e-commerce tools and solutions. In addition, AnyMind Group’s existing customers, including those outside Japan, gain access to Sun Smile’s nationwide offline distribution network.
- A unified O2O model that seamlessly connects social-driven demand with e-commerce operations and physical retail sales, supported with integrated online-offline data.
- AI-powered operational advancement through AI-driven planning and demand forecasting, in addition to the optimization of production-to-retail operations across both online and offline channels.
