Student Era.

Research was the first thing that made me feel alive. I grew up in a science high school where the entire culture revolved around discovery: forming hypotheses, running experiments, and bringing something new into the world. That obsession brought me to Tokyo Tech on a government scholarship at 18, because it was a place that took research as seriously as I did.

The same instinct drives everything I do now. It just moved from the lab to the product.

“The most important thing I learned at university was not how to find the right answer, but how to question the answers I thought were right.”
GSEP Graduate Voices, Tokyo Tech, Feb 2026Read the interview (opens in a new tab)
  1. 2017Life

    MEXT Scholarship, Thailand to Japan

    Japanese Government scholarship. Moved to Tokyo at 18 to study engineering in a language I was still learning.

  2. 2019Community

    TSAJ Idea Day, Thai Students' Association in Japan

    Turned our annual academic conference into an idea contest, as main organizer and MC

    Idea Day is the Thai Students' Association in Japan's annual academic conference. As Head of Activities, I questioned why the conference had to look the way it always had, and proposed turning it into an idea contest, which brought far more energy and fun to the event. I was the main organizer from the very first planning session through to the day itself, leading a 30 person team for 150+ participants. On the day, I also served as MC and ran the contest. Our keynote speakers and judges were Somkiat Tangkitvanich (President, Thailand Development Research Institute), Ketwadee Marumura (writer and founder of Marumura), and Niti Chaichitathorn (TV host and producer, GMMTV), and the night closed with a live concert by Getsunova, one of Thailand's most popular bands at the time.

    • Ornida speaking into a microphone at a podium, hosting TSAJ Idea Day
      MC for the contest.
    • Group photo of Idea Day participants and judges seated in a hall
      Participants and judges in the main hall.
    • Ornida with Somkiat Tangkitvanich, President of the Thailand Development Research Institute
      With Somkiat Tangkitvanich, President of TDRI.
    • Ornida with Niti Chaichitathorn, TV host and producer at GMMTV, at Idea Day
      With Niti Chaichitathorn, TV host and producer at GMMTV.
    • Ornida wearing a staff badge, holding a TSAJ Idea Day speech bubble sign and a thumbs up prop
      On staff duty for the day.
    • The band Getsunova performing on stage while the audience takes photos
      Getsunova closing the night.
  3. 2021StudyFeatured

    B.Eng, Transdisciplinary Science & Engineering (GSEP), Tokyo Tech

    A deliberately cross disciplinary program, engineering that refuses to stay in one department.

    GSEP interview: how this program shaped my product work(opens in a new tab)
  4. 2021AwardFeatured

    Outstanding Pitch Award, Tokyo Tech E×S Challenge

    One of 4 winning pitches out of 20 teams, with an idea of our own

    Led Unsolved, a five person team of international Thai students, to one of four PITCH stage wins at Tokyo Tech's Engineering × Sustainability Challenge, out of 20 competing groups pitching business ideas against the UN SDGs, judged on technical feasibility, impact, and business potential. Our pitch: the neglected, unglamorous problems of student life that nobody was officially responsible for fixing. We advanced to the STORM mentorship stage with Nomura Research Institute consultants.

    Tokyo Tech News: E×S Challenge win(opens in a new tab)
    • Ornida and the four other members of the Unsolved team standing outside a Tokyo Tech building, wearing masks
      Team Unsolved, mid pandemic, right before the PITCH round.
    Our winning pitch at the E×S Challenge PITCH round.
    What I remember

    "Student life is one of the most important times in anyone's life, and nobody should be ignored," is the line I kept coming back to when we pitched. Unsolved wasn't a flashy piece of technology. It was the problems everyone quietly puts up with because no one's officially in charge of fixing them. That's still my instinct: before I ask what we should build, I ask who's being ignored.

    Five of us, all Thai, all figuring out Japan at the same time I was. It was less "startup pitch competition" and more the first real test of whether I could turn a shared, unspoken frustration into something we could stand in front of judges and defend.

  5. 2021Part-time Job

    Website manager, Tokyo Tech online education

    Alongside graduate school, I worked part time for Tokyo Tech's online education team (now OCRD, part of the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning). I originally built the team's website from scratch, in English and Japanese, and kept it up to date.

    Visit the website I originally built(opens in a new tab)
  6. 2022AwardFeatured

    CFA Institute Research Challenge, Japan winner

    Beat 26 university teams, Tokyo Tech's first win since 2013

    I was the only member without a finance background on a four person Tokyo Tech team that beat 26 university teams to win Japan's national final. We researched and valued Daikin Industries: a full equity report, then a live presentation and Q&A in front of practitioner judges at SMBC Nikko Securities. Ranked 1st in document review nationally, and Tokyo Tech's first win since 2013. We went on to represent Japan in the Asia Pacific regional round.

    Tokyo Tech News: CFA Japan win(opens in a new tab)
    • The four person Tokyo Tech team holding their trophies after winning the CFA Institute Research Challenge Japan final
      The team, right after the win. Ornida, far left.
    • The winning team with their faculty advisor and mentor from Asset Management One
      With Assoc. Prof. Kyoko Nagata and our mentor from Asset Management One.
    What I remember

    "The CFA Institute Research Challenge gave me a taste of the financial world, which I had never tried," is what I told the university paper afterward, and it's still the honest version. I wasn't the finance person on that team. I was the engineer who had to learn to read a company the way I'd read a system: business profile, industry overview, competitiveness, and the ESG angles that don't show up cleanly in a spreadsheet.

    My teammates were brilliant, but what I think truly won it was that we didn't think alike. Looking at the same numbers from different angles caught things none of us would have seen alone. It's the same reason I still look for the person in the room least like me before I trust a decision.

  7. 2023Research

    Master's thesis: Physical Internet based shared logistics networks

    Python simulations turned into policy that protects truck drivers

    Developed multi agent simulations of Physical Internet based shared logistics networks in Python (object oriented programming, rule based behavior modeling, optimization), proposing public policies to protect truck drivers from overwork and fatigue.

  8. 2023Study

    M.Eng, Industrial Engineering & Economics, Tokyo Tech

    Graduated with a 90.6/100 GPA, specializing in quantitative systems modeling.

The same curiosity now drives my product work.

See how it turned into shipping AI products, or reach out directly.

Read the resume →

Tokyo, Japan · ok.ornida@gmail.com

PDF resume available on request.