Innovators in Japan: Weekly Digest 9/3/2018

Shohei Narron
Sep 3, 2018 · 3 min read

Each week in our Innovators in Japan series, we feature the latest trends and key people within the Japanese startup ecosystem. We’ve discussed a wide variety of topics from the state of FinTech, to SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son’s ambitions.

This week, our topic of discussion is a US-born 4th generation Japanese American who decided to move halfway across the globe to make a difference in Japan’s entrepreneurship culture, one student at a time. Meet Steve Sakanashi, founder of Sekai Creator.

Read more in the article here

Macro View:

Crowdport: Japanese social lending grows to ¥100bn (~$900m) in first half of 2018, at 2x annual growth. More here: https://bit.ly/2wpbEuy

New Rounds:

Activ8, operator of virtual character agency upd8, raises ¥600m (~$5.4m) from gumi and Makers Fund as they prepare for global business expansion. More here: https://bit.ly/2PcxvNo

Bespo!, a service for restaurant reservation with LINE, raised ~¥100m (~$900k) from Keisuke Honda and LINE Ventures | LINEチャットでレストラン予約の「ビスポ!」にLINE、本田圭佑氏らが出資 https://tcrn.ch/2BTzC74 #Japanese #startup

Leapfrog Ventures, a seed-stage VC firm Led by ex-Incubate Fund investor Takuma Terakubo, invested $50k in Kenyan social commerce management SaaS BisharaBot. More here: https://bit.ly/2wiMoHg

MerryBiz, an accounting virtual assistance service, raised ¥150m (~$1.35m) from Fuyo Sogo Lease and ,the Accretive Group to accelerate its business process outsourcing business. More here: https://bit.ly/2MW7t3u

Plant Form, a Niigata-based aquaponics startup, raised ¥20m (~$180k) for its monitoring and controls system development. More here: https://bit.ly/2olGlx7

Rakuten, a leading Japanese ecommerce company, entered the crypto exchange arena with move to acquire company Minna no Bitcoin aka “Everyone’s Bitcoin” (@minbtc) for ¥265m (~$2.3m). More here: https://tcrn.ch/2Po592T

requpo, on-demand hair stylist matching startup, raised ¥230m (~2m) from istyle, Energy & Environment Investment, Adways, iSGS, Monex Ventures, and SMBC Venture Capital. More here: https://bit.ly/2wrghnU

StarBurst, a seed stage accelerator operated by Protostar, completes ots 5th demo day; “asset management for apparel shop” SMASELL wins out of 8 contestants. More here: https://bit.ly/2Pbq1ue

Toyota, a Japanese auto maker, invested $500m in Uber as it aims to launch autonomous vehicle services by 2021.More here: https://tcrn.ch/2P8enA8

TRANBI, online M&A matching service, raised ~¥1.1bn (~$10m)from SBI Investment and Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, et al. to solve the lack of successors to SMB companies. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2MSQJKL

Quick Updates:

Alice.style, a personal item sharing platform, and IoT PO box startup SPACER announces partnership. More here: https://bit.ly/2LBV7sT

CLAS, an affordable furniture rental startup, released its service; widens tenants’ options to furnish their living quarters. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2wrYtd7

ERAS, a tech worker education and software dev outfit, and AI Academy operator CyberBrain announces partnership in EdTech. More here: https://bit.ly/2NBZ7vl

frame00, a Japanese UI/UX company, announced the development of a new crypto token to foster open source ecosystem growth. More here: https://bit.ly/2NlNmZz

GA Technologies, a pre-owned real estate market solution provider, launched the Blockchain Strategy Center to accelerate blockchain technology and business development. More here: https://bit.ly/2PNPbQE

GHELIA, a consumer AI technology R&D joint venture by Sony CSL, venture firm World Innovation Lab, and UEI, announced its plans to release new services within 2018; will allow anyone to leverage AI from a browser. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2wqURYP

LINE, Japanese telecommunications and search company, released its token economy concept along with plans to create a LINE ecosystem around own blockchain. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2NzSx8y

Metro Engines, short-term rental management Cloud provider, launched corporate apartment management Monthly Engines. More here: https://bit.ly/2PIQmkp

Prevent, a Nagoya-based medical data analytics startup, launched a lifestyle disease management app Mystar. More here: https://bit.ly/2MFid7m

Property Access Asset, a Singapore-based Japanese property management solution, adds blockchain development firm LayerX and real estate marketplace tsukuruba as partners for their new platform Cryptorealty. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2omDJz9

Quoine, a blockchain FinTech and crypto exchange operator, announced their migration to Liquid aiming to improve market liquidity, and plans to launch new platform on Sept 4th. More here: https://bit.ly/2NlNCYx

scouty, an AI-based recruiting SaaS company, launched its product along with a feature detecting signs of job switching.More here: https://tcrn.ch/2BMOFPS

Sony Music Entertainment, a global music conglomerate, launched its accelerator ENTX (ent-ex) to support businesses for social good. More here: https://bit.ly/2osSMHC

UUUM, a YouTube influencer marketing and talent management agency, released its new audition platform NOCHISTA, bringing gamification to the auditioning process. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2C0aLhY

Verses, an AR/VR blockchain foundation, opened its Tokyo office with Japanese tele-existence startup Telexistence. More here: https://tcrn.ch/2PUprlF

Shohei Narron

Written by

Born and raised in Japan, working in Silicon Valley, sent back to Japan as an expat. Founder of Innovators in Japan.

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