How to Start: Advices from Startup Founders in Kansai
When you are thinking about turning your idea into a full-fledged business, any nugget of advice you can get is precious. Makers Boot Camp & Kyoto Startup Summer School (KS3) invited three startup founders to take the mystery out of what it takes to build your own business. Take notes of these lessons for your own venture!
We’ve been fortunate to have many incredible speakers throughout our venture to build startup ecosystem in Kyoto. Tech entrepreneurs with big dreams told us how they brought world-changing ideas to the market, investors shared essential tips on how to succeed in raising funds and business coaches fueled our cross cultural team with confidence to take the business forward.
What do we do with all that knowledge?
Of course, one of the most important tasks in a community is to pass on the knowledge that has been gathered from experienced entrepreneurs to the aspiring ones. We always strive to encourage entrepreneurial talent and innovative spirit among students all over the world. This time we had a very special joint Monozukuri Hub Meetup co-organized by Makers Boot Camp and the KYOTO Design Lab as part of Kyoto Startup Summer School 2018. Passionate students from 17 countries came to Japan to get immersed into the local startup community while setting their entrepreneurial mindsets.
Sushi Suzuki, chief organizer of Kyoto Startup Summer School and associate professor at the KYOTO Design Lab, Kyoto Institute of Technology: KS3 brings together students, workshop facilitators, and lectures from around the world, and I thought it was a perfect opportunity to show Kyoto’s startup ecosystem. While a lot has been written about Silicon Valley, most people don’t see what a small but growing startup scene looks like, especially in Japan. The meetup and panel discussion format also helped us break out of the the usual lecture format and involve more local aspiring entrepreneurs who came to the event.
The event kicked off with an opening speech of Makers Boot Camp Head of Marketing Sabrina Sasaki, who highlighted particular challenges that startups face. ‘Our task is to help startups deal with the lack of necessary resources, support with prototypes and mass manufacturing’, she says. It took only a year for one of our portfolio cases Smart Shopping to scale up — next month they are already launching their first batch of 10,000 hardware products.
‘Members of any startup community have to support and give each other credits for the hard work. Startups’ achievements give me a great pleasure because I see the concrete results all the hard work they are doing on a daily basis’, says Sabrina.
Pioneers of recommendation services in Japan: Silver Egg Technology, Osaka
The first keynote speaker was Thomas Foley from Silver Egg Technology, Japan’s premier AI-powered recommendation company. Its mission is to provide a service for small and medium sized businesses that don’t have an in-house technology to predict what each customer wants. Founded in the beginning of the internet era in 1998, the company went public and was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in 2016. Currently the company’s AI technology powers specific recommendations on hundreds of Japan’s top websites. The road to getting the startup off the ground proved a rough one for its founders, though.
‘When I was working in Japan and had just got married, the subsidiary company I used to work for failed and left me stranded. I was lucky because my wife also wanted to start a business. We decided to put her in charge of sales and me in software,’ recalls Thomas.
When Silver Egg Technology went public, the company was featured on Nikkei, one of the world’s largest financial newspapers, thousands of users came to their website on the first day, crashing the company’s server. ‘It was an experience not to forget,’ laughs Thomas.
Advice from Thomas: The secret to success — if there is one — is that you have to be prepared for the risks and hardships; you really have to believe in yourself.
From cash-strapped in California to success in Japan: Nota Inc., Kyoto
A number of successful founders have found themselves facing a bankruptcy, only to successfully stick it out and find firmer financial footing again. Isshu Rakusai from Nota Inc., is one of those fortunate people who gets to do what he loves for a good money. During his sophomore year in high school, he designed scrapbook software Kami copi that generated $2.5 million in total sales.
In 2007, then as an aspiring entrepreneur, he moved to Palo Alto, California, determined to start another venture but quickly realized he had ‘no friends, no bank account, and no house to live.’ His startup had its big break later in 2010 after Rakusai returned to Japan, with the lessons he learned in the United States. Currently, Nota’s flagship product is Gyazo, a cloud-powered screenshot application that shares screenshots by instantly copying a custom URL to the user’s clipboard.
When asked how Nota could succeed, Isshu Rakusai mentions dogfooding, a slang term used to refer to a situation in which an organization uses its own product. ‘We had a really hard time but we made something that we believed in and wanted to have for ourselves,’ he says. Another key point he recommends startups should consider: “if you find an nice angel investor, he will provide you with both money and experience.”
Turn your crazy idea into a solution: Atmoph, Kyoto
At last, Atmoph CEO Kyohi Kang shared an inspiring story of the world’s first smart digital window that opens to hundreds of beautiful scenery from around the world. Back in 2004, as a robotics student in Los Angeles, he was stressed by the limited view from his own window. ‘Every day I’d shut the blinds down making the room dark,’ he says. Ten years later, Kyohi joined his partner and co-founder Kyohei Nakano to reinvent the way users travel and connect with nature from indoor’s locations.
After launching a Kickstarter campaign, Atmoph easily hit the goal of $100,000 to cover their manufacturing costs. His Kickstarter experience was fun but really exhausting because of the time difference between Japan and USA. The amount raised wasn’t sufficient but Atmoph has had a stroke of luck raising funds from several investors, including lately Makers Boot Camp (2018).
Read our story about Atmoph, Digital Window for Travelers
‘Before Kickstarter, we talked to VCs who said that we were the only ones who needed this product. Now we are shipping our digital windows worldwide and establishing partnerships with other industries’, says Kyohi with a big smile.
The best piece of advice he can give is to just get started. ‘No matter how crazy your concept might be, try to show your prototype and persuade investors with your passion’.
Guest speakers’ presentations continued with a fruitful panel discussion moderated by Sushi Suzuki. The panelists discussed how to start looking for money, deal with copycats, persuade investors and other common questions from a curious audience. Watch the full live streaming on our Facebook page!
One of the main reasons why many people don’t go big is that they just don’t know how to start. Shoot us a message to get a support!
