Masahiro Hara

Masahiro Hara (born 1957) is a Japanese engineer and Hosei University graduate who is best known for inventing the QR code in 1994.[1][2]

Masahiro Hara
Masahiro Hara
Masahiro Hara
Born1957
Tokyo
NationalityJapanese
Alma materHosei University
Known forInventing the QR code
AwardsEuropean Inventor Award

Early life and education

Hara was born in Tokyo in 1957.[3] He studied in the department of electric and electronic engineering at Hosei University.[1][4] He graduated in 1980.[5]

Career
Example of a QR code for mobile English Wikipedia

Denso and QR code invention

Hara invented the QR code to track car parts while he was working at the Japanese company Denso Wave, which had a Toyota contract.[6][7][8][9] Hara had been given the task of coming up with a better way of tracking parts used in the automotive industry, and had helped develop a barcode system in the 1980s.[10] One day at work, over a lunchtime game of go, he recognized the game's black and white pattern could be used to encode information.[10] The code was introduced in 1994.[11]

In 2021, QR codes were being used to book and track COVID-19 tests and contact tracing.[10] Hara has stated that he would like to develop QR codes for additional medical purposes, including imaging such as x-rays or electrocardiogram data.[2] Hara still works for Denso as of 2022.[1]

Japan International Cooperation Agency

Hara was the chief engineer and advisor for a Japan International Cooperation Agency's "School For All" program to improve education in Niger.[12][13]

Selected publications
  • Co-author of chapters 7 & 12 of "Educational development through community-wide collaboration", 2020 book "Community Participation with Schools in Developing Countries" ISBN 9780429057472[14][15]

Awards

In 2014, he and the inventors of the QR code development team were awarded the European Inventor Award.[16]

References
  1. "Meet the Man Who Invented The QR Code". Worldcrunch. 2022-01-24. Retrieved 2022-01-30.
  2. Oba, Yumi (19 November 2021). "'Father of QR code' says the technology's future is in storing important medical information". SBS Japanese. Retrieved 2 February 2022.
  3. "TEDxAnjo | TED". www.ted.com. Retrieved 2022-04-10.
  4. Hara, Masahiro (2019). "Development and popularization of QR code: —Code development pursuing reading performance and market forming by open strategy—". Synthesiology English Edition. 12 (1): 19–28. doi:10.5571/syntheng.12.1_19. S2CID 203138539.
  5. "Members of Faculty Pamphlet" (PDF). Hosei University. p. Cover page. "Hosei Alumnus, Masahire Hara invented QR code (1994) Denso Cp. Ltd. Graduated from Hosei University in 1980
  6. Gapper, John (2020-10-30). "Ant and Covid have made the humble QR code a hit". Financial Times. Retrieved 2022-01-30.
  7. "The Little-Known Story of the Birth of the QR Code". nippon.com. 2020-02-10.
  8. Boulton, Jim (2014). "The QR Code". 100 Ideas that Changed the Web. Quercus Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78067-642-5. This all changed in the early '90s at Denso Wave, a subsidiary of Toyota. An engineer called Masahiro Hara was tasked with creating a barcode that could hold more information than the existing format. His solution was the Quick Response (QR) code…
  9. Dobrescu, Andra (July 2015). "Implications of QR Codes for the Business Environment". Calitatea. 16 (S3): 166–169. ProQuest 1694670714.
  10. "'I'm pleased it is being used for people's safety': QR code inventor relishes its role in tackling Covid". the Guardian. 2020-12-11.
  11. Goodrich, Joanna (13 November 2020). "How a Board Game and Skyscrapers Inspired the Development of the QR Code". IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News.
  12. Kharas, Homi J.; Linn, Johannes F. (2013). Getting to Scale: How to Bring Development Solutions to Millions of Poor People. Brookings Institution Press. pp. 296, 300. ISBN 978-0-8157-2419-3.
  13. "JICA Experts, Back in Japan, Are Granted an Audience with Their Imperial Highnesses Prince and Princess Akishino, Princess Mako and Princess Kako" (Press release). Japan International Cooperation Agency. 1 October 2018.
  14. "Community Participation with Schools in Developing Countries: Towards Equitable and Inclusive Basic Education for All". Routledge & CRC Press. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  15. Maruyama, Takao; Kurosaki, Takashi (December 2021). "Do remedial activities using math workbooks improve student learning? Empirical evidence from scaled-up interventions in Niger". World Development. 148: 105659. doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2021.105659. S2CID 239705164.
  16. Office, European Patent. "Masahiro Hara, Motoaki Watabe, Tadao Nojiri, Takayuki Nagaya, Yuji Uchiyama (Japan)". www.epo.org.

Further reading
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