Moi Corporation, the company behind Japanese mobile live streaming app TwitCasting, announced that it has fundraised $5 million from Indonesia’s Sinar Mas Group leading and Japanese seed investor East Ventures also participating.
Our readers may recall that the company raised $634,000 from East Ventures back in May 2013.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Toreta, the startup that provides the reservation management system for restaurants, announced today it has raised 200 million yen (about $2 million) from Silicon Valley-based investment company WiL (World Innovation Lab). See also: Toreta: A new reservation management app for restaurants in Japan Coinciding with this announcement, the company also unveiled that Kengo Yoshida, the former executive at Japanese internet giant GMO Pepabo, will join the board of management on July 1st. They will use the funds to strengthen their engineering and marketing forces. Since its launch in December, the company has acquired more than 1,000 restaurants as users. The service’s monthly charge is 9,000 yen (about $90) a restaurant, so its easy to figure out how much money they are making every month. According to the company’s CEO Hitoshi Nakamura, about 500,000 restaurants annually generate $226 billion in the Japanese restaurant industry. He said that the company will target the top 20% of restaurants in Japan, which will bring in revenue of about $98 million. But I think their investors will not be satisfied with this figure. How do they evolve the restaurant business? Many restaurants that use a conventional online reservation…
From the left: COO Kengo Yoshida, CEO Hitoshi Nakamura
Tokyo-based Toreta, the startup that provides the reservation management system for restaurants, announced today it has raised 200 million yen (about $2 million) from Silicon Valley-based investment company WiL (World Innovation Lab).
Coinciding with this announcement, the company also unveiled that Kengo Yoshida, the former executive at Japanese internet giant GMO Pepabo, will join the board of management on July 1st. They will use the funds to strengthen their engineering and marketing forces.
Since its launch in December, the company has acquired more than 1,000 restaurants as users. The service’s monthly charge is 9,000 yen (about $90) a restaurant, so its easy to figure out how much money they are making every month.
According to the company’s CEO Hitoshi Nakamura, about 500,000 restaurants annually generate $226 billion in the Japanese restaurant industry. He said that the company will target the top 20% of restaurants in Japan, which will bring in revenue of about $98 million. But I think their investors will not be satisfied with this figure.
How do they evolve the restaurant business?
Many restaurants that use a conventional online reservation platform, like OpenTable, check a reservation book and manually input reservations to the online system. This process is time-consuming and can cause booking errors.
However, Toreta can check the status of table availability of participating restaurants using the platform and help them fill their vacancies by sending them customers in an efficient way. Nakamura explained:
We can manage the table availability of restaurants as our inventory using the system. In this way, we are more likely to receive reservations through foodie websites and send them to the restaurants. We are planning to develop an API to integrate with marketing websites (such as Tabelog or Gurunavi).
Because many competitors are targeting this market, Nakamura understands that the company will have to acquire the top spot within a couple of years to survive. The company has been steadily acquiring users, but they invited Yoshida to join the team to strengthen their online marketing strategy. Yoshida told us how he will proceed:
Our revenue is still dependent on the efforts of our sales representatives. But we will explore what to do for our online marketing from now. But people working in the restaurant industry can be very digitally challenged. So we may need to make offline efforts as well.
It will be interesting to see how the company will evolve the restaurant business with the digital technology.
Disclosure: The author’s wife has a business relationship with Toreta.
See the original story in Japanese. Vasily, a Tokyo-based startup which runs online fashion coordination service iQON, announced today that it has surpassed 1 million users. Coinciding with this announcement, the company rebranded its logo design. Since its launch back in April 2010, the service has acquired over 1 million coordinated outfits and listed over 4 million fashion items. Each item introduced on the website is linked to other e-commerce sites where you can buy it, and they drive over 1 million times the traffic to these affiliated e-commerce sites a month. They also announced that some of these sites earn over $1 million in their monthly revenue from iQON users. Will iQON disrupt the fashion e-commerce landscape? Over this past year, we’ve seen many startups have been competing with each others to gain as much time of smartphone users as possible with their mobile services, which is truly remarkable in the space of curated information sites for females. These sites are easy to launch because they don’t need to prepare resources but can be created through use of content from other media sites. But I think this concept does not apply to iQON since the curated fashion site is…
Vasily, a Tokyo-based startup which runs online fashion coordination service iQON, announced today that it has surpassed 1 million users. Coinciding with this announcement, the company rebranded its logo design.
Since its launch back in April 2010, the service has acquired over 1 million coordinated outfits and listed over 4 million fashion items. Each item introduced on the website is linked to other e-commerce sites where you can buy it, and they drive over 1 million times the traffic to these affiliated e-commerce sites a month. They also announced that some of these sites earn over $1 million in their monthly revenue from iQON users.
Will iQON disrupt the fashion e-commerce landscape?
Vasily CEO Yuki Kanayama
Over this past year, we’ve seen many startups have been competing with each others to gain as much time of smartphone users as possible with their mobile services, which is truly remarkable in the space of curated information sites for females. These sites are easy to launch because they don’t need to prepare resources but can be created through use of content from other media sites.
But I think this concept does not apply to iQON since the curated fashion site is not one where users consume content passively like other curated content sites. In response to this idea, the company’s CEO Yuki Kanayama told us their service motivates users to act impulsively upon understanding the fashion trends and buying new outfit. This perspective can be proven by the fact that some of their affiliated e-commerce sites obtain 25% of the user traffic from iQON, and others generate a monthly revenue worth over almost $1 million.
All media sites have to make money to survive. So they have to establish intimate relationships with their users and provide them with values enough so that the users are willing to pay fees. As proven by iQON with their business, we have to be more focused on metrics and results. Through its integration efforts with e-commerce sites, it will be interesting to see how iQON can bring a new concept upon generating revenue streams to curated content sites.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Movida Japan publicized its new regime on Wednesday. While CEO Taizo Son will remain in his current position, their “chief accelerator” Kengo Ito is leaving the initiative and will become more focused on managing their spun-off investment fund called Genuine Startups as a general partner. Instead of Ito, Hideyuki Shimane will be named to head the acceleration program. Coinciding with this reorganization, Movida Japan changed its participation criteria for startups in their acceleration program, the participants not necessarily being required to be a Movida investment vessel, while the period for every batch of the program was cut by two months, from six months to four. They will announce the acceptance for applications for a new batch when it becomes available. See also: Meet Japan’s seed accelerators and VC firms [MAP] Separating incubation and investments Movida Japan has been providing its incubation program and seed investments. They initially used their own funds for these investments, but this role was transferred to their spun-off fund Genuine Startups back in 2013. They intended to make an explicit separation of the two functions with this, but the problem was Ito was forced to administer both of them. They explained about what happened to…
L to R: Kengo Ito (Genuine Startups), Hideyuki Shimane (Movida Japan)
Tokyo-based Movida Japan publicized its new regime on Wednesday. While CEO Taizo Son will remain in his current position, their “chief accelerator” Kengo Ito is leaving the initiative and will become more focused on managing their spun-off investment fund called Genuine Startups as a general partner. Instead of Ito, Hideyuki Shimane will be named to head the acceleration program.
Coinciding with this reorganization, Movida Japan changed its participation criteria for startups in their acceleration program, the participants not necessarily being required to be a Movida investment vessel, while the period for every batch of the program was cut by two months, from six months to four. They will announce the acceptance for applications for a new batch when it becomes available.
Movida Japan has been providing its incubation program and seed investments. They initially used their own funds for these investments, but this role was transferred to their spun-off fund Genuine Startups back in 2013. They intended to make an explicit separation of the two functions with this, but the problem was Ito was forced to administer both of them. They explained about what happened to them over the past year:
Aiming to incubate more high-profile startups, we established a shared office space called Startup Dojo in Shibuya last year. As a result, it led to more high-profile startups. But as our portfolio exceeded over around 50 companies, it turned out we unable to spend time enough to follow up on their business developments or help them seek their next round funding opportunities.
Movida Japan decided to appoint Shimane as head to address this issue. He had been substantially committed to creating the content of the incubation program since launch. Shimane explained about what they aim to do with the reorganization at this time:
We aim to eliminate possible misunderstanding from people that startups graduating from our program are solely after fundraising through our investment scheme. That’s why we’ll enhance co-investments in them with other seed investors.
Typical seed accelerators scrape up their operating cost from management fees from their funds or capital gains. But with the reorganization at this time, Movida Japan will lose its existing income source and need to find another revenue stream. Shimane told us how they will solve this problem:
We’ll make money by helping established companies build and run their in-house incubation initiatives, which is similar to what US-based startup incubator TechStars is providing to major companies. We established such a program with Yahoo Japan back in July, and I think they will soon announce the results made over the past year.
We understand they are receiving requests to help run similar projects at other companies. Regarding their weekly lecture session inviting outstanding entrepreneurs as guest speakers, it has been provided on an invitation-only basis but will be opened up to anyone. For audience convenience, the session will be rescheduled to 7pm on Wednesdays, because many Japanese companies encourage employees not to overtime work every Wednesday; more aspiring entrepreneurs may be expected to attend.
Sacha Greif is a designer and developer born in France, now based in Osaka, Japan. I’ve been interested in his work for some time, as he is also a prolific writer who frequently shares what he’s doing on his blog and on Twitter. Practical side projects of his (like Patternify and Folyo [1]) are valuable assets to the design community. For me, with my rather limited development and design skills, what I like about his output is that he can express the technicalities of development and design as well as he does. It’s all amazingly accessible, for people of all skill levels. Among Sacha’s most recent projects has been a book called Discover Meteor, written with Tom Coleman, devoted to explaining the Meteor web framework. For those not familiar with it, Meteor is a relatively easy-to-use framework built on Node.js. I’m a (perpetually) novice programmer, and even I could get set up with Meteor thanks to a handy tutorial over on the Discover Meteor blog. Incidentally, for anyone who’d like to try Meteor, Sacha and Tom have made the first four chapters of their book available for free online [2], and obviously that’s a great place to get started. For…
Sacha Greif during a visit to Tokyo last year
Sacha Greif is a designer and developer born in France, now based in Osaka, Japan. I’ve been interested in his work for some time, as he is also a prolific writer who frequently shares what he’s doing on his blog and on Twitter. Practical side projects of his (like Patternify and Folyo[1]) are valuable assets to the design community. For me, with my rather limited development and design skills, what I like about his output is that he can express the technicalities of development and design as well as he does. It’s all amazingly accessible, for people of all skill levels.
Among Sacha’s most recent projects has been a book called Discover Meteor, written with Tom Coleman, devoted to explaining the Meteor web framework. For those not familiar with it, Meteor is a relatively easy-to-use framework built on Node.js. I’m a (perpetually) novice programmer, and even I could get set up with Meteor thanks to a handy tutorial over on the Discover Meteor blog. Incidentally, for anyone who’d like to try Meteor, Sacha and Tom have made the first four chapters of their book available for free online[2], and obviously that’s a great place to get started. For folks here in Tokyo who want to connect with other Meteor enthusiasts, Sacha is organizing a meetup Thursday night:
When I met with him late last year, Sacha explained to me that the framework and the book are growing side-by-side, right along with the Meteor community:
There is more interest in Meteor, and people are talking about the book, which has sort has become the default book to learn Meteor. And even the guys at Meteor themselves use this as a training material and recommend it to other people.
The book has just recently passed its one year anniversary, and is now being translated into many different languages by the Meteor community. Those translations are being made available for free, which is a great way to help grow the community beyond Meteor’s San Francisco roots [3].
The full edition of the book even comes a couple of screencasts, and in my own learning experience, watching someone go through tasks step by step on the command line in immensely helpful. I like that the Meteor tutorial doesn’t assume much prequisite knowledge on the part of the user, and it provides useful links to further resources to fill the gaps when appropriate.
Sacha noted that while Meteor is a powerful tool, the way that it’s built really helps learners jump in without encountering major problems:
What’s really cool is that the back and front end are integrated into one environment. It removes a lot of barriers, because, for example if you want to build a Rails app you’ll need to know HTML, CSS, Ruby and Rails, Javascript, and you may need a Javascript framework like Backbone or Angular. With Meteor, you still need HTML or CSS, but it’s much simpler to learn I think.
I understand the book has been selling pretty well, with 313 books sold (including 55 upgrades) during their recent 10-day anniversary sale.
For developers and designers who are leaders in a given field, what Sacha and Tom have done with this book is an interesting example of building a revenue stream while building a community around a growing technology. If you haven’t checked out Meteor or the Discover Meteor book yet, I encourage you to give it a read!
When I mentioned to my brother, a graphic designer, that I’d be speaking with Sacha, he instantly recognized these tools as ones that he has used and loved. ↩
You can get this in PDF form by signing up for their newsletter. ↩
Regrettably, no one has stepped up to contribute to a Japanese translation of the book. So if there are any Japanese speaking Meteor enthusiasts out there, it would be great to see some involvement on that front. You can learn more about that here. ↩
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Showcase Gig, the startup best known for its mobile wallet and CRM (customer relationship management) platform’O:der‘ (pronounced ‘order’), announced yesterday that it has developed a new ordering system called ‘Smart O:der’ in association with United & Collective, the company behind several Japanese restaurant chains. The new system will start operating tomorrow at the 3rd Burger hamburger restaurants in Aoyama and Roppongi Hills shopping complex in Tokyo. The video below shows how the system works. When you download the ‘O:der’ app to a smartphone and associate your credit card information with your account, you can order food and pay the bill using the app before you go to a ‘Smart O:der’ system-enabled restaurant. Before the introduction of this new system, users could order in advance but had to pay the bill at the restaurant. When you place an order and make payment using the app, your order will then be transmitted to the restaurant. Upon arrival at the restaurant, a sensor device installed there will detect your arrival and notify the kitchen staff to start preparing your food. With this system you will not need to wait long for your food or wait in…
At yesterday’s press briefing: Showcase Gig CEO Takefumi Nitta (right), United & Collective CEO Hideya Sakai (left)
Tokyo-based Showcase Gig, the startup best known for its mobile wallet and CRM (customer relationship management) platform’O:der‘ (pronounced ‘order’), announced yesterday that it has developed a new ordering system called ‘Smart O:der’ in association with United & Collective, the company behind several Japanese restaurant chains.
The new system will start operating tomorrow at the 3rd Burger hamburger restaurants in Aoyama and Roppongi Hills shopping complex in Tokyo. The video below shows how the system works.
When you download the ‘O:der’ app to a smartphone and associate your credit card information with your account, you can order food and pay the bill using the app before you go to a ‘Smart O:der’ system-enabled restaurant. Before the introduction of this new system, users could order in advance but had to pay the bill at the restaurant.
When you place an order and make payment using the app, your order will then be transmitted to the restaurant. Upon arrival at the restaurant, a sensor device installed there will detect your arrival and notify the kitchen staff to start preparing your food. With this system you will not need to wait long for your food or wait in a long line to pick up your “to go” meals. United & Collective tested the system at their restaurants and found it could double their order processing speed during lunch peak hours.
Coinciding with this announcement, Showcase Gig rolled out a new feature that allows retailers to give users digital loyalty customer stamps or reward coupons using the beacon-based noncontact type authentication system for iOS, which is the first of its kind in the world, they explained.
The company is planning to add a new service allowing users to pick up their orders at a restaurant at the time appointed in advance.
Masaru Ikeda
Takeshi Hirano
Rick Martin
Junya Mori
