The SBI Group provides various types of financial information from an investor-oriented perspective based on the customer-centric principle. Morningstar objectively evaluates and ranks investment trusts, individual stocks and other financial products as a neutral agent, not as a vendor. In addition, investors receive support when selecting financial products and services.

Based on an extensive database, Morningstar can provide customers with easy-to-understand, high value-added information over a wide range of financial products including investment trusts and stocks. This quantitative and neutral information covers financial content not only on the SBI Group sites, but on major portal sites as well. Morningstar also provides customized data and research reports for financial institutions.

In April 2008, Morningstar Japan made Kabushiki Shimbun Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary to combine contents owned by both of the companies. Morningstar will further strive to provide richer financial information, and to jointly develop new products and services.

By providing a wide range of financial information, Morningstar engages in investment education and knowledge building to empower investors, which is essential to secure the future of investments in Japan. Morningstar Japan integrates its high capability for evaluations of investment trusts cultivated by Morningstar, Inc. (US), with the SBI Group's information infrastructure technology centered on the Internet. Our ultimate goal is to offer quality financial information to investors in order to contribute to the steady growth of Japan's financial industry.

Gomez Consulting intends to utilize its know-how obtained through research and analysis services primarily for e-commerce websites, based on its management philosophy that the company will contribute to the Japanese society through fair and objective comparison and evaluation of e-commerce channels, as well as improvement of customers' convenience. Gomez Consulting offers enterprise consulting services such as website convenience improvement, advisory services and marketing research based on sound understanding of "business trends" and "characteristics of the Internet". Furthermore, the company also offers services to build and design websites based on multilateral website analysis in accordance with customers' needs.