A man with assets of 300 billion yen.
He lost almost everything due to an arrest.
He spent 18 years paying off 20.87 billion yen in damages.
Yet, in 2025, when asked about his savings, he immediately replied, "About 10 billion yen."
This man is Takafumi Horie, also known as Horiemon.
He is the entrepreneur with the largest swings of ups and downs in Japan.
Do you know what Horie-san is spending most of his time on right now?
It's AI.
To be honest, I researched all of Horie-san's videos and statements to write this article.
And I felt a bit frustrated.
Because he isn't doing anything particularly special.
The Misconception: "It's only because he's Horiemon"
Many people think:
"He can master it because he's Horiemon."
"It's because he has money and connections."
Actually, that's not true.
90% of his AI utilization can be imitated exactly using free or low-cost tools costing a few thousand yen a month.
The only difference is one thing:
"Throw the troublesome tasks to AI, and let humans use their brains more."
He is simply 100 times more thorough about this than we are.
*The concept of his book, "Horie Takafumi's ChatGPT Encyclopedia," is exactly this: "Throw troublesome tasks to ChatGPT and let humans use their brains more."
In this article, I have organized Horie-san's AI usage into 7 points based on books, videos, and reports.
By the time you finish reading, you can take all seven home in a form you can "imitate starting tomorrow."
It's long, so I recommend saving it if you want to look back later.
1: Use it as a "Sparring Partner" for Business Decisions
Using AI only as a replacement for search.
Many people stop there.
What's interesting is that Horie-san himself was originally a skeptic of using AI for brainstorming.
In the GPT-4 era, he revealed that when he saw people using it for brainstorming, he thought, "Honestly, are you serious?"
That changed completely after he touched GPT-5.
"It hardly lies anymore."
"I'm asking it everything."
"It feels like having a highly capable secretary."
Regarding market analysis for new businesses, he even says, "I'm seriously using it."
If you want to imitate him, use this consultation template:
We are currently running a business called XX. We are struggling with YY. Give me 3 options and tell me the risks for each.
Provide information in the order of "Current Situation → Problem → Question."
Just doing this changes the quality of the answers you get.
By the way, Kenjiro Araki, the co-author and representative of Horiemon AI, reportedly conducts business consultations via voice while walking around the city with AirPods connected.
The secretary (consultation partner) is now in your pocket.
2: Delegate Research with "Specific Conditions"
This is easiest to understand with a real example from a video.
When making a video about the Okinawa theme park "Junglia," Horie-san had GPT-5 research the capacity of Naha Airport, which is considered a bottleneck.
The second runway, flight slots, and terminal constraints.
He went that deep to pull out a granular answer: "It can handle up to 30 million people per year."
The point is how to give instructions.
"That information might be old. Search and update it."
Assuming the AI's knowledge is old, he makes it search to modernize the data.
Work that would take a human researcher several days is finished during a conversation.
Even when deciding event dates, he had the AI identify overlaps with other large-scale events in the vicinity.
If you instructed a human, they would definitely miss something.
3: Don't Watch Videos; Let AI Summarize Them
This one is surprising.
Horie-san almost never watches videos for information gathering.
"I thought watching videos takes too much time. I have them summarized."
He praised Gemini's video summarization feature as "insane" and absorbs information after converting videos back into text.
While the world is moving from "text to video," Horie-san is doing the opposite: "video to text."
He finishes absorbing a 30-minute video in 3 minutes.
In a day, it's a difference of dozens of minutes.
In a year, it's a difference of hundreds of hours.
4: For Writing Tasks, "Provide Materials First"
This is a usage revealed in "Horie Takafumi's ChatGPT Encyclopedia."
Horie-san receives a massive number of requests for book jacket blurbs.
In those cases, he has ChatGPT read part of the book's content and generate the comment text.
For English papers, he provides the original text and has it summarized.
Did you notice the commonality?
He doesn't make it write from scratch.
He always makes it write "after providing the materials."
AI without materials writes plausible lies. AI with materials does the work.
It's the same as outsourcing work to a person.
If you don't even provide materials and just say "write something good," there's no way something good will come back.
5: Consult AI Even for Health Management
In a video discussing GPT-5, this real-world example popped up:
When he sent an image of a gastroscopy (upper GI endoscopy) to the AI, "it analyzed it just like a doctor."
At this point, it goes beyond a secretary and into the realm of a primary care physician.
However, I will be honest.
AI analysis is for reference only.
It does not replace medical judgment.
Horie-san's side also clearly states in the same video that "agent tasks (AI performing actual work on behalf of humans), like hotel reservations, are still weak," acknowledging the limits of AI.
Don't use it believing it's omnipotent; identify what it's good at and delegate those tasks.
You should imitate this sense of distance as well.
6: Create Your "AI Clone" and Make It Work
This is where Horie-san's true strength lies.
Horie-san has an AI avatar (clone) called "Horiemon AI" that looks exactly like him.
It handles special lectures at the Horiemon AI School and appears in message videos as a "Horiemon AI Ambassador" for companies.
Furthermore, there is even a "Takafumi Horie chatbot" that has learned 10 years' worth of newsletter data.
Even while he is sleeping, his clone speaks, teaches, and answers.
"That's only possible because he's a celebrity," you might think.
No.
If you just want to create an "AI that answers on your behalf" by feeding your past writings and knowledge into an AI, you can do it today with GPTs.
I myself create and distribute GPTs packed with my own knowledge, and the mechanism is exactly the same.
7: Don't Stop at the Individual; AI-ize the "Whole Company"
Finally, a matter of scale.
Horie-san didn't stop at using AI as a personal technique; he turned it into a business called "Horiemon AI School."
According to representative Araki-san, over 200 companies and 2,000 people have learned there (as of November 2025, based on statements in the program).
And in the program, it is asserted:
"AI is something the business owner must do, or it will never work."
Even if you dump it on the front lines, AI integration won't progress.
The person who decides the direction must touch the AI first.
If you are a sole proprietor, you are the business owner.
Instead of thinking about "which task to save time on," think about "where in the business to insert AI."
This order is Horie-san's conclusion.
What I Became Certain of After Researching
What Horie-san is doing isn't a special technology.
It is a design of "deciding the scope of delegation and focusing oneself on judgment."
Brainstorming, research, and AI clones all stem from this single philosophy.
And here is the most important part.
Horie-san, with 10 billion yen in savings, and I, a former teacher, and you—the AI we use is the same.
Even if you pay for it, it's only a few thousand yen a month.
The performance gap in tools is now almost zero.
The only thing that makes a difference is "what you decided to delegate."
The reason AI doesn't work well isn't because its ability is low.
It's because you are hesitating.
Summary: 7 AI Utilization Techniques of Horiemon
- Use it as a sparring partner for business decisions
- Delegate research with specific conditions
- Have AI summarize videos
- For writing tasks, provide materials first
- Consult even for health management
- Create your AI clone and make it work
- AI-ize the whole company, not just the individual
For today's first step, just number 1 is fine.
Try talking to the AI about one problem you are currently facing in the order of "Current Situation → Problem → Question."
A secretary with the same performance as the man who paid off 20.8 billion in damages is already in your smartphone.
Finally
What did you think?
One last thing.
Actually, I did the research and fact-checking for this article together with AI.
It was also AI that picked up statements from Horie-san's videos and cross-referenced them with reports.
And for a limited time only.
I am distributing a collection of "20 bonuses" packed with the know-how I actually use in my AI business.
- Claude / Codex / ChatGPT / Gemini Complete Mastery Guide, 11 volumes.
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- 6 practical AI tools you can use as-is.
- The entire process of launching an AI business and generating 3.27 million yen in the first month.
Total of 20 items. And they are all free.
You can get them all without attending seminars or free individual consultations.
It sounds like a lie, doesn't it? But it's true.
How to receive them is simple.
It starts by joining the LINE Open Chat below.
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What's needed isn't technology. It's just a design that doesn't let the AI hesitate.
Why not end the exhaustion of "AI just doesn't seem to work well for me" today?
References
- "Horie Takafumi's ChatGPT Encyclopedia" by Takafumi Horie and Kenjiro Araki (Gentosha, 2023)
- YouTube "GPT-5 is too amazing! Horiemon's AI utilization and the DX crisis of local companies?" Takafumi Horie Horiemon Official Channel (Nov 27, 2025)
- YouTube "Too many people aren't using Google's god AI tools properly" Horiemon's School (Clips)
- INTERNET Watch "Takafumi Horie settles by paying 20.87 billion yen to former Livedoor" (Dec 2009)
- J-CAST "Takafumi Horie: 'I only recently finished paying off' damages related to the Livedoor incident" (Sep 2024)
- Livedoor News "Takafumi Horie confesses to over 10 billion yen in assets!? 'REAL VALUE' direct interview" (2025)
- Horiemon AI School Official Site (horiemon.ai)
- Mynavi &Engineer "'Horiemon AI' that looks exactly like Takafumi Horie"
*Achievements and figures are based on public information at the time of writing. Results may vary by individual.
