See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Open Network Lab, the startup incubator operated by Digital Garage and its affiliated companies, announced today it has started accepting applications for the ninth batch of its seed accelerator program. This batch will run from July to September of this year, with qualifying startups able to work from the incubator’s Daikanyama space (in Tokyo). Participants can also work at the recently established DG717 venue in San Francisco, where they can develop products, explore funding opportunities, and receive mentoring in the heart of the US startup community. Since its launch back in 2010, the program has incubated 45 startups over the past eight batches. Many of their graduates have been aggressively seeking business opportunities in Silicon Valley and Japan. You may recalled movie crowdsourcing platform Viibar raised $3 million from Globis Capital Partners and Gree Ventures back in February. On a related note, the incubator will hold a demo day on April 23rd to showcase startups from their eighth batch, so please stay for our coverage of that event. You can also check out our previous articles covering past demo days. Your submissions for the ninth batch will be accepted until May 19th.
A workshop held at DG717, Digital Garage’s incubation space in San Francisco.
Tokyo-based Open Network Lab, the startup incubator operated by Digital Garage and its affiliated companies, announced today it has started accepting applications for the ninth batch of its seed accelerator program.
This batch will run from July to September of this year, with qualifying startups able to work from the incubator’s Daikanyama space (in Tokyo). Participants can also work at the recently established DG717 venue in San Francisco, where they can develop products, explore funding opportunities, and receive mentoring in the heart of the US startup community.
Since its launch back in 2010, the program has incubated 45 startups over the past eight batches. Many of their graduates have been aggressively seeking business opportunities in Silicon Valley and Japan. You may recalled movie crowdsourcing platform Viibar raised $3 million from Globis Capital Partners and Gree Ventures back in February.
On a related note, the incubator will hold a demo day on April 23rd to showcase startups from their eighth batch, so please stay for our coverage of that event. You can also check out our previous articles covering past demo days.
Your submissions for the ninth batch will be accepted until May 19th.
See the original article written in Japanese Bento.jp, a new lunch delivery service for busy business people, launched last week. Now with just a few taps on your smartphone, you can get your freshly made bento box lunch [1] delivered in around 20 minutes, at a costs of 800 yen ($8) including the delivery fee. I interviewed the company’s CEO Atsumasa Kobayashi, who previously worked in Itokuro (a company later transferred to KLab), involved in launching its social games division and Shanghai branch office. He came back to Japan in 2013 and founded Bento.jp Inc this past January. Currently, he runs the company, along with engineer Masahiro Saito. He explains coming up with the idea for the service through his own experience. It was a time when I was so busy that I didn’t have many other choices than to go to convenience stores to get lunch to bring back to the office. I wished I had more options. I’d like to provide more alternatives for those who feel the same way, bringing some innovation to the existing lunch market which hasn’t changed in a long time. How is Bento.jp different from other food delivery services? The big difference is…
Bento.jp, a new lunch delivery service for busy business people, launched last week. Now with just a few taps on your smartphone, you can get your freshly made bento box lunch [1] delivered in around 20 minutes, at a costs of 800 yen ($8) including the delivery fee.
I interviewed the company’s CEO Atsumasa Kobayashi, who previously worked in Itokuro (a company later transferred to KLab), involved in launching its social games division and Shanghai branch office. He came back to Japan in 2013 and founded Bento.jp Inc this past January. Currently, he runs the company, along with engineer Masahiro Saito. He explains coming up with the idea for the service through his own experience.
It was a time when I was so busy that I didn’t have many other choices than to go to convenience stores to get lunch to bring back to the office. I wished I had more options. I’d like to provide more alternatives for those who feel the same way, bringing some innovation to the existing lunch market which hasn’t changed in a long time.
How is Bento.jp different from other food delivery services? The big difference is its convenience, a sort of Uber – but for lunches. Bento.jp reminds me of UberRUSH, a new service recently launched by Uber, which delivers packages on foot or by bike in New York city. Kobayashi adds:
Like Amazon, more and more companies are starting to deliver orders on the same day or the following day. What’s the next step? I’m sure more companies will try to deliver within hours, and then in less than an hour. Bento.jp wants to meet that expectation and bring customers what they want soon after they want it.
The bento that the company currently offers is the kind most people are familiar with, with things like rice and fried chicken. Their bento lineup is created by a chef with experience at the Michelin-starred French restaurant Chez Naka. The company plans to add more quality Bento to this lineup in the future.
Bento.jp first looks to achieve stable sales of about 1000 bento a day. And while the delivery area is currently limited to Shibuya, Dogenzaka and Roppongi, it aims to expand to other busy area later on.
The number of startups offering food-related services are growing around the world. If a company like Bento.jp can successfully respond to the customers’ needs, I believe there is a lot of potential to win repeat customers.
If you work in the area where service is available, do give Bento.jp a try. You can download the app for free from the App Store.
A bento lunch is a Japanese take-out box packed with rice and variety of side dishes, usually for one person. ↩
See the original article written in Japanese Cookpad, the Japanese online recipe platform, is largely recognized as a “user first” service. The Cookpad app recently surpassed 20 million downloads, and their latest data shows nearly 70% of access to the service comes from smartphones. This past February, the company built a mobile-first team. Among the company’s 70 engineers, about 10% joined the team. Aside from app development and operations, the company is pushing towards a mobile-first policy, encouraging web engineers to focus on mobile-related work. I spoke with Toshihiro Yagi and Kentaro Takiguchi, who have just joined this mobile-first team. Both have experience developing Android apps, and both came to Cookpad less than a year ago. The development of the Android app started within the device division of the media department, which later turned into the mobile-first team. The project started in October of last year, and after half a year of development, the Android app officially launched this past March. The mobile version of Cookpad originally started as a website formatted for smartphones. At that time, even though the division had dozens of web engineers, it had only one Android engineer. To adapt to the increasing number of users…
Toshihiro Yagi and Kentaro Takiguchi from the mobile-first team
Cookpad, the Japanese online recipe platform, is largely recognized as a “user first” service. The Cookpad app recently surpassed 20 million downloads, and their latest data shows nearly 70% of access to the service comes from smartphones.
This past February, the company built a mobile-first team. Among the company’s 70 engineers, about 10% joined the team. Aside from app development and operations, the company is pushing towards a mobile-first policy, encouraging web engineers to focus on mobile-related work.
I spoke with Toshihiro Yagi and Kentaro Takiguchi, who have just joined this mobile-first team. Both have experience developing Android apps, and both came to Cookpad less than a year ago.
The development of the Android app started within the device division of the media department, which later turned into the mobile-first team. The project started in October of last year, and after half a year of development, the Android app officially launched this past March.
The mobile version of Cookpad originally started as a website formatted for smartphones. At that time, even though the division had dozens of web engineers, it had only one Android engineer. To adapt to the increasing number of users on smartphones, it was decided to offer Cookpad as a native app.
The team of four (three Android engineers and one designer) worked together to develop the Android app. They collaborated on the app’s UI and usability, using the engineer’s knowledge of things like OS guidelines. Based on the mockup created by the designer, they worked towards creating the best app they could.
Consistent UX/UI
The iOS app for Cookpad had been already released, so the team had to be careful that the Android app design would not be influenced too much by that. To ensure that the app was easy to use, the team continued releasing small, incremental updates. One such update, for example, had the menu icon located in the left-top corner. The team learned that some users don’t recognize that the icon can be tapped to display a menu, and so they they implemented a tutorial message a the initial log-in to address the issue.
Takiguchi: It took much time to figure out to what extent the usability and UI of our iOS and Android apps should be unified. Many people say there should be a consistent user experience for iOS and Android, and the UI should be designed differently. But that’s a very difficult thing to do.
Through these small improvements, eventually the amount of time users spent on the Android app increased 30% more than they had seen with the previous version, which looked more like the service’s web interface. Swifter movement through content inside the app and improved tab display (such as today’s recipe and top recipe) also contributed much to this success. Yagi explained that one of the most important things to keep in mind during this kind of development is to keep asking if a feature is really necessary, and if it is easy to use.
Results that get attention
Cookpad has an internal blog where members share ideas. Since last November the company has also organized a meeting called Potechi where engineers outside and inside the company get together to share technical tips. Potechi takes place every week within the company, and every month for the external meet. Each iOS or Android engineer is given five minutes to present their tips.
Yagi: Engineers at Cookpad are all highly motivated and have great technical skills. When we find a problem, we all do our best to solve it.
Takiguchi: Our CEO often says that each member has to keep a career goal in our mind when we work. He says we should create results that will attract headhunters’ attention.
Cookpad currently look for mobile engineers. To work on the mobile-first team, the most important thing is to have strong passion for app development rather than technical skills and experiences.
Yagi: We look to see if the candidate codes at home or outside the work place. We look for someone who looks like they cannot help but code at any occasion.
The value of female engineers
At present, all members of mobile-first team are men. Even in the company as a whole, female engineers amount to only 10% of the total. Engineers are expected to see things from the user’s perspective in order to find the best usability and UI by working with designers. Therefore, they hope they can add a force of female engineers as well.
Yagi: We interview users and hear their opinion. But when we reflect on app design, we might need to filter out perspectives that come from the male point of view. I believe that if the engineer is a woman, then it can effect the app design a lot. So we really hope female engineers can join our team.
It is not going to far to say that a major service like Cookpad could set the standard for app usability and UI. If you are passionate about creating apps, you might want to join their Potechi meeting. The next one takes place on May 14th.
If you’re starting to tire of seeing Line’s characters all over the place here in Japan, I have some bad news for you. Line is teaming up with fashion retailer Uniqlo to offer Line Character branded t-shirts as part of the new Uniqlo t-shirt (UT) line-up [1]. In my view, Uniqlo lends some much-needed credibility to Line’s characters, putting them alongside far more established brands like Hello Kitty and Disney. The shirts are on sale now for the very affordable price of 943 yen (or just over $9). Check out Uniqlo’s promo video for the new 2014 line-up below, including the new Line t-shirts about halfway through. (It’s an unlisted video, so if this embed suddenly stops working, you know why!) Via news.ameba.jp As far as I can tell, this is just for Uniqlo stores in Japan. I can’t find the Line t-shirts on the Uniqlo USA website. ↩
If you’re starting to tire of seeing Line’s characters all over the place here in Japan, I have some bad news for you. Line is teaming up with fashion retailer Uniqlo to offer Line Character branded t-shirts as part of the new Uniqlo t-shirt (UT) line-up [1].
In my view, Uniqlo lends some much-needed credibility to Line’s characters, putting them alongside far more established brands like Hello Kitty and Disney. The shirts are on sale now for the very affordable price of 943 yen (or just over $9).
Check out Uniqlo’s promo video for the new 2014 line-up below, including the new Line t-shirts about halfway through. (It’s an unlisted video, so if this embed suddenly stops working, you know why!)
With its new 4.2.0 Android update today, Japanese messaging app Line rolled out something that it’s calling ‘Sticons’. The company says that these can be used like emoticons inline in text messages, and also as the sort of larger stickers that current users of the service are already familiar with. You can read more about this new feature over on the Line blog.
With its new 4.2.0 Android update today, Japanese messaging app Line rolled out something that it’s calling ‘Sticons’. The company says that these can be used like emoticons inline in text messages, and also as the sort of larger stickers that current users of the service are already familiar with.
This is a part of our coverage of the Japan New Economy Summit 2014. You can follow our updates on Twitter as well at @thebridge_e. On day two of the New Economy Summit here in Tokyo last week, we heard a panel about how venture capitalists can help entrepreneurs both here in Japan and abroad. Moderated by Daisuke Iwase, the president and COO of Lifenet Life Insurance Company, the session included: George Kellerman, managing partner and fire chief at 500 Startups Akio Tanaka, partner at Infinity Ventures LLP David Lee, co-founder and managing partner at SV Angel SV Angel’s David Lee kicked off the session by making a brief introduction to his firm. Since its launch back in 2009, SV Angel have been investing in tech notable startups including Twitter, Pinterest, Square, Dropbox, and Airbnb in their early stages. Akio Tanaka introduced Infinity Venture Partners’ recent activities in nurturing the start ecosystem in China. He gave us a look at the Chinese answer to Angellist, 36kr (one of their portfolio startups), as well as their recently established startup hub in Beijing, TechTemple. To accelerate the startup ecosystem in Japan, he emphasized that large companies should play a key role. In…
From the left: David Lee (SV Angel), Akio Tanaka (Infinity Venture Partners), George Kellerman (500startups)
On day two of the New Economy Summit here in Tokyo last week, we heard a panel about how venture capitalists can help entrepreneurs both here in Japan and abroad. Moderated by Daisuke Iwase, the president and COO of Lifenet Life Insurance Company, the session included:
George Kellerman, managing partner and fire chief at 500 Startups
Akio Tanaka, partner at Infinity Ventures LLP
David Lee, co-founder and managing partner at SV Angel
SV Angel’s David Lee
SV Angel’s David Lee kicked off the session by making a brief introduction to his firm. Since its launch back in 2009, SV Angel have been investing in tech notable startups including Twitter, Pinterest, Square, Dropbox, and Airbnb in their early stages.
Infinity Venture Partners’ Akio Tanaka
Akio Tanaka introduced Infinity Venture Partners’ recent activities in nurturing the start ecosystem in China. He gave us a look at the Chinese answer to Angellist, 36kr (one of their portfolio startups), as well as their recently established startup hub in Beijing, TechTemple.
To accelerate the startup ecosystem in Japan, he emphasized that large companies should play a key role. In the US, such companies have been helping startups by circulating capital and human resources around the ecosystem. Even in China, larger organizations such as Baidu and Tencent are investing in tech startups more and more rather than buying them out or copying their business models.
500startups’ George Kellerman
500 Startups’ George Kellerman says that his firm has invested in more than 700 companies in the last four years. Noting that established companies in Japan reserve as much as 150 trillion yen (about $1.5 trillion) as their retained earnings, he insisted that they have to put at least 0.1% of it towards accelerating the startup ecosystem. That could either be by acquiring startups, forming funds, or investing in existing investment funds. Another important effort needed for the ecosystem can be made by inviting more women to the workplace, he says.
Addressing a question about how investors can help entrepreneurs, Lee said that one of the most important roles for investors is to serve as a mentor and role model:
In addition to providing money, investors need to help entrepreneurs hire good people, and advise with their business development and overall business operations, since younger entrepreneurs typically don’t have management experience.
Kellerman added:
A lot of VC people have operating background from the tech industry. My founder Dave McClure previously worked with PayPal as head of engineering, and I also worked with Yahoo and Dell. For investors, money is the easy part. That’s a commodity. Investors have to pass on their knowledge of operational experience to startups.
This is a part of our coverage of the Japan New Economy Summit 2014. You can follow our updates on Twitter as well at @thebridge_e. On day two of the New Economy Summit here in Tokyo last week, we had a chance hear a panel discuss the benefits that Silicon Valley can have for Japanese entrepreneurs. This session was moderated by Gen Isayama, co-founder and CEO of WIL (World Innovation Lab), and the participating speakers included: Noriyuki Matsuda, CEO of Sourcenext Hironobu Yoshikawa, CEO and co-founder of Treasure Data Hitoshi Hokamura, chairman of Evernote Japan Satoshi Sugie, CEO and co-founder of Whill [1] Recently more Japanese investors and entrepreneurs have been moving to Silicon Valley. In order to get to the bottom of this trend, Isayama asked the panelists why they set up bases in Silicon Valley. Japanese software distribution company Sourcenext established a local subsidiary in Silicon Valley back in 2012, and has partnered with notable companies to distribute packaged editions of their software products. Since that office opened, Matsuda has spent more than a half of his time in Silicon Valley. He explained: I had no option but to come to Silicon Valley by myself. I used to…
From the left: Hitoshi Hokamura (Evernote Japan), Hironobu Yoshikawa (Treasure Data), Noriyuki Matsuda (Sourcenext), Satoshi Sugie (Whill)
On day two of the New Economy Summit here in Tokyo last week, we had a chance hear a panel discuss the benefits that Silicon Valley can have for Japanese entrepreneurs. This session was moderated by Gen Isayama, co-founder and CEO of WIL (World Innovation Lab), and the participating speakers included:
Noriyuki Matsuda, CEO of Sourcenext
Hironobu Yoshikawa, CEO and co-founder of Treasure Data
Recently more Japanese investors and entrepreneurs have been moving to Silicon Valley. In order to get to the bottom of this trend, Isayama asked the panelists why they set up bases in Silicon Valley.
Japanese software distribution company Sourcenext established a local subsidiary in Silicon Valley back in 2012, and has partnered with notable companies to distribute packaged editions of their software products. Since that office opened, Matsuda has spent more than a half of his time in Silicon Valley. He explained:
I had no option but to come to Silicon Valley by myself. I used to make having short trips there, but I subsequently figured out that it’s difficult to arrange appointments with locals unless I have a base there. During the several months that I’ve been there, we made a lot of good partnerships. So finally I decided to hand my previous role at headquarters over to some reliable people and I started living in Silicon Valley.
Sourcenext’s Noriyuki Matsuda
The discussion moved on to Hokamura-san, who is known to have worked at Apple as director of marketing in the early 1990s when it was far less common for Japanese businessmen to work in Silicon Valley. He looks back at that time, explaining:
I had no intention to launch a business during the time. Why do I still stay there? Maybe because I can meet many exciting people. In Japan, I think we need to consume more of our energy on trivial tasks.
Evernote Japan’s Hitoshi Hokamura
Prior to launching his next-gen wheelchair startup, Sugie previously worked at Nissan, and also as a Japanese teacher for non-Japanese speakers. He explained his relocation:
Compared to the electric vehicle industry, the US market is 15 times larger than that of Japan. If you look at the number of vehicles sold annually, it’s 300,000 in the US versus 20,000 in Japan. So we decided to launch our first prototype in Silicon Valley. The area has a larger base of early adopters and it’s easier to arrange interviews with people, including investors and consumers.
Whill’s Satoshi Sugie
Yoshikawa previously worked with the investment arm of Japanese trading company Mitsui & Co. Isayama asked him why he abandoned such a good position to launch a startup. Yoshikawa explained:
Since I was investing in tech companies, it was natural for me to be in Silicon Valley. But I subsequently found huge potential in big data, so I launched a startup doing that business by myself.
Treasure Data’s Hironobu Yoshikawa
Isayama also asked about the challenges of doing business in Silicon Valley. Wheel’s Sugie confessed he had many difficulties hiring local talent.
Hiring is so hard in the US. When we interview potential employees, they try to sell themselves saying “I’m very confident I can fill a role at your company” or “My skills are a great fit for your company.” It’s not like Japan where employers can believe in a resumé from an interviewee. We definitely need to speak to at least three people that they have worked with before prior to hiring. I think there’s a huge cultural gap around hiring.
Sugie wrapped up the session by speaking about the attraction of Silicon Valley and encouraged audience members to launch their business there:
Silicon Valley is obviously awesome. But the geography doesn’t matter so much. Europe is great. China is also great. I think the mindset that entrepreneurs have in Silicon Valley is pretty important. Once you have it, you can go anywhere and launch your business anywhere in the world.
WIL’s Gen Isayama moderates the panel
You can check out our exclusive interview with Sugie in this article. ↩
Last week Original Stitch, a service that lets you order customized shirts online using a sort of 3D preview (see how here), opened to the Japanese market. This week we had a chance to speak with CEO and founder Jin Koh (of Bleu Flamme, the San Francisco company that runs the service) here in Tokyo to find out a little more about how its doing. I was curious to hear from him that the the shirts are actually made in a factory here in Japan. Koh didn’t give me too many details, but emphasized that their focus on a quality product and beautiful packaging – even at a higher production cost – was key if they were going to deliver quality to customers. But even so, the price is more than competitive as he explains: This shirt is a $160 shirt if you get it off the shelf, and you can get it off the shelf with this experience because we have no retail stores. And everything is made on demand – there’s no inventory, no warehouse, therefore we can pass on a lot of savings to the customer. The packaging is indeed very sharp looking (pictured above), and it’s…
Original Stitch’s package/product
Last week Original Stitch, a service that lets you order customized shirts online using a sort of 3D preview (see how here), opened to the Japanese market. This week we had a chance to speak with CEO and founder Jin Koh (of Bleu Flamme, the San Francisco company that runs the service) here in Tokyo to find out a little more about how its doing.
I was curious to hear from him that the the shirts are actually made in a factory here in Japan. Koh didn’t give me too many details, but emphasized that their focus on a quality product and beautiful packaging – even at a higher production cost – was key if they were going to deliver quality to customers. But even so, the price is more than competitive as he explains:
This shirt is a $160 shirt if you get it off the shelf, and you can get it off the shelf with this experience because we have no retail stores. And everything is made on demand – there’s no inventory, no warehouse, therefore we can pass on a lot of savings to the customer.
localized website (need Japanese browser to view)
The packaging is indeed very sharp looking (pictured above), and it’s certainly something I wouldn’t mind getting in the mail if I wasn’t a blogger who only wears pajamas [1]. In the US their main competitors are IndoChino (suits, but they also sell shirts) and Blank Label. Koh is very encouraged by the exposure they’ve gotten here in Japan over the last week since announcing the service here, and he figures they are already the number one player after their closed beta. They’ve had assistance from Tokyo-based InSprout in localization, and they’re pleased with the initial traction that they’ve gotten here as a result.
Original Stitch is comprised of 12 people right now, and Koh is looking ahead to a future for the company that could go far beyond just shirts:
I see us as a technology company and not an e-commerce company, because what you see on our site today – shirts are just the first product. And I think if you ask me the plan for the next two years, soon you will see a website and pick out a product, and instead of seeing a product picture and a buy button, you’ll see a picture and a customize button. […] If users take the time to create something, then it means they’re more likely to buy it. That shows in our conversion rate which is three times that of regular e-commerce. This is not just a product off the shelf. This is a product you have customized.
They’re taking a very data-driven approach to growth, trying to build as many users as possible and then converting them into paying users. It will be interesting to watch how the company evolves from here, and we look forward to watching how their business unfolds (pun intended). Check out their promotional video below, which features Inoko Toshiyuki, president of TeamLab.
Japanese fashion commerce service Magaseek today unveiled a new Magaseek Kids service today. The company found that among a surveyed sample of their customers in their 30s and 40s, most had kids. And this new portal aims to serve that demographic by offering brands and fashions for kids of various ages, as well as an assortment of goods for mothers too. Magaseek is one of many successful fashion services that have done well serving the female demographic here in Japan. Via CNet Japan
Japanese fashion commerce service Magaseek today unveiled a new Magaseek Kids service today. The company found that among a surveyed sample of their customers in their 30s and 40s, most had kids. And this new portal aims to serve that demographic by offering brands and fashions for kids of various ages, as well as an assortment of goods for mothers too.
See the original story in Japanese. Moff launched its Kickstarter campaign for its wearable wristbank smart-toy almost a month ago. The project nearly reached $80,000, four times its initial goal of $20,000. According to the product’s creator, Akinori Takahagi, they have even surpassed smart toy Ubooly (backed by TechStars) in funds raised on Kickstarter. Ubooly secured seed funding of about $2.5 million from several investors back in November, and recently started sales at Softbank stores in Japan. So the Moff team considers Ubooly the benchmark in their growth strategy. The team is working on many business opportunities. This includes developing content for the device and partnering with content holders with popular characters or mascots, and delivering the product as soon as possible. Moff was initially launched at a hackathon in Osaka last year, and we understand that they attracted much attention at SXSW in Austin. It will be interesting to see how their product is received by consumers beyond the Japanese market.
Moff launched its Kickstarter campaign for its wearable wristbank smart-toy almost a month ago. The project nearly reached $80,000, four times its initial goal of $20,000.
According to the product’s creator, Akinori Takahagi, they have even surpassed smart toy Ubooly (backed by TechStars) in funds raised on Kickstarter. Ubooly secured seed funding of about $2.5 million from several investors back in November, and recently started sales at Softbank stores in Japan. So the Moff team considers Ubooly the benchmark in their growth strategy.
The team is working on many business opportunities. This includes developing content for the device and partnering with content holders with popular characters or mascots, and delivering the product as soon as possible.
Moff was initially launched at a hackathon in Osaka last year, and we understand that they attracted much attention at SXSW in Austin. It will be interesting to see how their product is received by consumers beyond the Japanese market.
Masaru Ikeda
Yukari Mitsuhashi
Rick Martin
Takeshi Hirano
