Japan Opens up Manufacturing and Healthcare Sectors to Indian Companies

The Japanese Government is now inviting Indian companies to explore business opportunities in the Manufacturing and Healthcare sectors under its Society 5.0 initiative.

“Japanese Government has come up with the concept of new smart society, “Society 5.0” which envisions to address various social challenges arising due to acute human resource shortage and the ageing society through the adoption of new age technologies like, Industry 4.0 i.e, AI, IoT, Big Data, Robotics, etc. Such initiatives would further create a great demand for Indian Information Technology, Engineering and Start-ups to explore several business opportunities especially, in the field of Manufacturing, Mobility, Healthcare and Agriculture etc,” said Shinya Fujii, Director, Service Industry Dept., JETRO HQ, while speaking at an event organised by the Japan External Trade Organisation and Bangalore Chamber of Industry and Commerce.

“As business opportunities between Japanese and Indian companies are expected to grow manifold in future, it will also increase the outward investment from Indian Technology companies to Japan. Japan already has a strong presence of over 80 Indian companies, mostly comprising IT related and engineering companies, and is expected to grow significantly in the coming years with the Society 5.0 move,” he added.

Eight Indian startups pitched at the event : Oceo Water, Locus, Intellicar Telematics, Option3, Entropik, Vyuti, Tookitaki and Ezedox. The event also featured reverse pitches from three Japanese companies who are keen on investing in Indian startups: AGC Inc (Yusuke Mori), Symphony Creative Solutions (Atsuo Suzuki) and Sojitz Corporation (Hidemi Kuwahara).

In order to promote more investments from the Indian companies, JETRO has already established a dedicated Indian Desk under its “Invest Japan” initiative to assist and give step-wise support to Indian companies along with providing incubation facilities. So far, JETRO has facilitated the investment by approximately 35 Indian companies. JETRO is also helping business expansion of more than 60 Indian companies in Japan.

Anticipating this trend, JETRO has broaden the scope of its services under Invest Japan program to assist overseas start-up companies as well. Apart from providing Incubation facilities, JERTO will also extend services like mentoring, B2B facilitation and support in getting Japanese VC fund access to overseas starts ups.

“The relationship between Japan and India has expanded significantly in recent years, particularly in light of the changes that have taken place globally. Japan as we understand is home to many successful businesses, big and small. It is also a home to a thriving and diverse business community –Life sciences, high-end technology, advanced manufacturing and business services to list a few. The incentives and benefits that Japan offers to businesses, makes it a great place to locate a company,” said Kishore Alva, President BCIC & President and Executive Director, Adani — Udupi Power Corporation Ltd.

Nearly 200 delegates participated in the the ‘Japan- India Innovation Dialogue: To Co-Create Future Innovation’ in Bangalore.