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A mobile Q&A service finally done right? Meet Line Q

Junya Mori 2013.12.12

See the original article in Japanese Line, Japan’s popular mobile messenger app, has recently launched a new service. It’s called Line Q, and it provides a platform where users can interact each other by asking and answering questions on a range of topics. Users can post questions that they immediately need an answer for, at anytime and from anywhere using their smartphone. Other users can answer by posting text, pictures, videos, location information, and stickers – all in a mobile chat-format screen. There are some choices for those who post questions: they can choose a category related to their question, they can make their question open to all users, or they can restrict questions only to their friends, with both public and private options. Another unique function is the I want to know too! button, enabling users to share others’ questions on their timelines. Using their Line network, the posted questions can be shown to friends or experts with particular knowledge or skill. Private questions, however, cannot be shared using the “I want to know too!” button. Users can get points by answering the questions or being chosen as giving the “best answer”. When user points reach a certain level,…

See the original article in Japanese

Line, Japan’s popular mobile messenger app, has recently launched a new service. It’s called Line Q, and it provides a platform where users can interact each other by asking and answering questions on a range of topics. Users can post questions that they immediately need an answer for, at anytime and from anywhere using their smartphone. Other users can answer by posting text, pictures, videos, location information, and stickers – all in a mobile chat-format screen.

There are some choices for those who post questions: they can choose a category related to their question, they can make their question open to all users, or they can restrict questions only to their friends, with both public and private options.

Another unique function is the I want to know too! button, enabling users to share others’ questions on their timelines. Using their Line network, the posted questions can be shown to friends or experts with particular knowledge or skill. Private questions, however, cannot be shared using the “I want to know too!” button.

Users can get points by answering the questions or being chosen as giving the “best answer”. When user points reach a certain level, they can then convert them to cash. Users can even win bonus points depending on the number of times they’ve give the best answer. There is a monthly ranking system for users in each category, and in order to motivate users to answer questions, several schemes are being implemented. For example, top-rated users can be reward with double points for the following month.

In the past, many companies have attempted to build a Q&A service for mobile. But most of them had difficulty acquiring users and encouraging engagement. Line expects to solve the both problems with Line Q.

In the future, we might also see corporate accounts participating in Line Q. If companies can conduct surveys or find enhanced user participation, it could even replace some existing market-research services.

Line Q is currently available both iOS and Google Play. It’s in Japanese only for the time being.

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Japanese social illustration service Pixiv launches e-commerce platform for creators

SCORE 1,317

Junya Mori 2013.12.11

See the original article in Japanese Pixiv, Japan’s popular online social illustration platform, has just announced a new service. It’s called Booth, and it enables anyone – even those new to web design – to create online stores. The concept somewhat similar to Base, often referred as the Japanese Shopify, and Stores.jp. Booth has just opened to registration, with plans to launch officially on December 19th. So what is the difference between Booth and the other store-creating solutions like Base and Stores.jp? Booth’s strength lies in its integration with Pixiv, letting users promote products directly on the site, with searchable tags and notification of new products for Pixiv followers. Online stores will be connected to the existing community of the shop owners, making it easy to attract users. The stores will of course specialize in digital content such as illustrations, pictures, movies, music, and books. It will also be possible to offer the products for free so that shop owners can easily provide samples. Booth is being billed as a “creator friendly service”, which means that creators won’t need to pay any initial costs, monthly fees, or sales fees. Only transaction fees on credit card payments will be charged. So…

See the original article in Japanese

Pixiv, Japan’s popular online social illustration platform, has just announced a new service. It’s called Booth, and it enables anyone – even those new to web design – to create online stores. The concept somewhat similar to Base, often referred as the Japanese Shopify, and Stores.jp. Booth has just opened to registration, with plans to launch officially on December 19th.

So what is the difference between Booth and the other store-creating solutions like Base and Stores.jp? Booth’s strength lies in its integration with Pixiv, letting users promote products directly on the site, with searchable tags and notification of new products for Pixiv followers. Online stores will be connected to the existing community of the shop owners, making it easy to attract users.

The stores will of course specialize in digital content such as illustrations, pictures, movies, music, and books. It will also be possible to offer the products for free so that shop owners can easily provide samples.

Booth is being billed as a “creator friendly service”, which means that creators won’t need to pay any initial costs, monthly fees, or sales fees. Only transaction fees on credit card payments will be charged. So creators will be paid nearly the full amount of the product price.

Also if the user stores products in Booth’s warehouse, the company will assist the user in storing, packaging, and shipping. By providing these services, Pixiv hopes to help eliminate these problems to let creators focus on making better products.

I often visit the Pixiv site, as well as Tokyo Otaku Mode, a website curating content about Japanese Otaku/geek culture. Otaku Mode is divided into galleries that presents creators’ works and pictures, and online shops to sell Otaku-focussed products. Unlike Tokyo Otaku Mode, Pixiv previously had only a gallery. As a user of both services, I think Booth will add much value for Pixiv, in the same way that it added value for Otaku Mode, bringing more exciting experiences to users.

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Popular Japanese code learning platform ‘Dotinstall’ launches premium service

Junya Mori 2013.12.11

See the original article in Japanese If you regularly read The Bridge, it’s not unlikely that you might be a programmer or have at least some peripheral interest in coding. You may have also heard of the Japanese website Dotinstall, where you can find many resources to help you learn to code. This service was launched by the well-known blogger, Gen Taguchi (@taguchi), who runs popular weblogs like 100SHIKI and IDEA*IDEA. Dotinstall offers short three-minute tutorial videos for beginners. The service is very popular, surpassing 100,000 members in October of 2013. Now two years since its initial launch, Dotinstall recently announced it that it will add a premium service as part of its monetization. This premium service allows users to read the text captions of videos and also to read and search through related source code. The differences between this and the regular service is described in the following table. The premium service comes with many benefits, such as the ability to overview contents without watching the entire video, or skip forward to key points. The monthly fee for the new service is 880 yen (about $9), which is lower than many similar services from overseas. We have previously reported…

See the original article in Japanese

If you regularly read The Bridge, it’s not unlikely that you might be a programmer or have at least some peripheral interest in coding. You may have also heard of the Japanese website Dotinstall, where you can find many resources to help you learn to code. This service was launched by the well-known blogger, Gen Taguchi (@taguchi), who runs popular weblogs like 100SHIKI and IDEA*IDEA.

Dotinstall offers short three-minute tutorial videos for beginners. The service is very popular, surpassing 100,000 members in October of 2013.

Now two years since its initial launch, Dotinstall recently announced it that it will add a premium service as part of its monetization. This premium service allows users to read the text captions of videos and also to read and search through related source code. The differences between this and the regular service is described in the following table.

The premium service comes with many benefits, such as the ability to overview contents without watching the entire video, or skip forward to key points. The monthly fee for the new service is 880 yen (about $9), which is lower than many similar services from overseas.

We have previously reported (on our Japanese site) about a high school that provides programming classes. In Japan, as with everywhere else, coding can be a great asset to just about anyone.

If Dotinstall succeeds in the monetizing its premium service, it will be possible to add even more educational content. I am sure this will be a welcome service to aspiring programmers in this country.

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Madrid’s IE Business School and Keio University hold joint entrepreneur event in Tokyo

Masaru Ikeda 2013.12.11

Madrid’s IE Business School and the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University (KMD) jointly held their first Venture Day event for entrepreneurs in Tokyo. The former is well known for being one of the top producers of MBA graduates, and for its many entrepreneurship events. KMD is based in Tokyo, encouraging people to solve societal problems and create new businesses using cutting-edge digital media technologies. The event featured a number of talks from both Japanese and European entrepreneurs, as well as a pitch competition where 10 startups competed to win a round-trip ticket to Madrid, presented by Turkish Airlines. I won’t go through all the startups here as we have featured many of them before. But it was good to several new faces with fresh ideas. Let’s have a look. CompiTechnology If you work in the startup industry, how many devices do you bring in your bag to work each day? A tablet, and a smartphone too perhaps — but for programmers, you likely need a laptop too. All that can be heavy, and you probably need a lot of money to buy everything. CompiTechnology aims to develop a smart device that lets you what typically requires many…

Madrid’s IE Business School and the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University (KMD) jointly held their first Venture Day event for entrepreneurs in Tokyo. The former is well known for being one of the top producers of MBA graduates, and for its many entrepreneurship events. KMD is based in Tokyo, encouraging people to solve societal problems and create new businesses using cutting-edge digital media technologies.

The event featured a number of talks from both Japanese and European entrepreneurs, as well as a pitch competition where 10 startups competed to win a round-trip ticket to Madrid, presented by Turkish Airlines.

I won’t go through all the startups here as we have featured many of them before. But it was good to several new faces with fresh ideas. Let’s have a look.

topawardwinner-at-iekmdevent — MoneyTree wins the top award in the pitching session.

CompiTechnology

If you work in the startup industry, how many devices do you bring in your bag to work each day? A tablet, and a smartphone too perhaps — but for programmers, you likely need a laptop too. All that can be heavy, and you probably need a lot of money to buy everything.

CompiTechnology aims to develop a smart device that lets you what typically requires many smart devices to do. The company hasn’t disclosed too many details about this, but we do know that they are devoting $1 million for the R&D efforts for the production of their next product.

Smart Lab Module (by Molcure)

For many scientific researchers, you will need different devices for difference experimental purposes. This costs a lot. There is a multi-functional device that can be adopted for many experiments, but it can require millions of dollars ^[1].

A University of Tokyo graduate student had the idea to develop a lighter version of this kind of devices, making the most of smartphone technology, a hardware module, and an SDK. For researchers, one of the key advantages is that it would untether you from your lab, as it gives you the ability to check the status of an experiment using your smartphone regardless of where you are.

Studio4word

Studio4word provides a multilingual narration and translation service. Our readers may recall startups Voip and Creofuga who offer solutions in this space. But Studio4word is different in its easy-to-understand pricing structure. Regardless of what language you choose, their pool of native speakers will receive your job offer for 1,000 yen (about $10) for every 100 words in non-Japanese languages, or for every 100 characters in Japanese.

They also provide translation and proofreading often needed for foreign language narration. I assume the service will target startups who want to create promotional videos for their services for the global market.

Sharebu Kids

Sharebu Kids is a flash-sales e-commerce site focused on kids’ fashion. Their strategy is to partnering with baby fashion brands from overseas that have no presence in Japan, buying their products for Japanese consumers, and presenting them at affordable rates. At the same time, it gives brands the opportunity to get their name out in the Japanese market.

The company is not interested in working with well-known baby brands, since they typically have local distributors or their own flagship stores, and they would usually force retailers to sell at non-discounted prices. By giving brands benefits besides just revenue, Sharebu Kids hopes to provide a unique user experience for consumers.

For example, there’s the Mahoro lab Android developed by the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology. ↩

news

This popular Japanese mobile stylus was born from shoe-making technology

Yukari Mitsuhashi 2013.12.11

When it comes to tablet pens, there are so many options available for consumers. But recently here in Japan, one tablet stylus called Touch Pen Pro has been getting more and more popular. In fact, to accommodate to the growing demand, the company behind the product began distributing to major electronics stores, as opposed to just selling online. The pen’s maker may come as a surprise to you, however. The company, Akaishi, is a shoe maker that was founded way back in 1946. Yes, you heard me right. A shoe maker. Akaishi has long specialized in making practical shoes based on biomechanics, and they are now sold in overseas markets as well. In the 1990s, the company also began developing reasonably priced health and fitness products, but it was constantly searching new businesses that leverage both its technology and its factory facilities. And so back in December of last year, Akaishi launched its new product, the Touch Pen Pro. The fluffy tip of the pen is made of conductive fiber, which differentiates the pen from regular silicon pens. Because of this special fiber, there is less friction when the pen is stroked on screen, only 20% as much as a…

When it comes to tablet pens, there are so many options available for consumers. But recently here in Japan, one tablet stylus called Touch Pen Pro has been getting more and more popular. In fact, to accommodate to the growing demand, the company behind the product began distributing to major electronics stores, as opposed to just selling online.

The pen’s maker may come as a surprise to you, however. The company, Akaishi, is a shoe maker that was founded way back in 1946.

Yes, you heard me right. A shoe maker.

Akaishi has long specialized in making practical shoes based on biomechanics, and they are now sold in overseas markets as well. In the 1990s, the company also began developing reasonably priced health and fitness products, but it was constantly searching new businesses that leverage both its technology and its factory facilities. And so back in December of last year, Akaishi launched its new product, the Touch Pen Pro.

The fluffy tip of the pen is made of conductive fiber, which differentiates the pen from regular silicon pens. Because of this special fiber, there is less friction when the pen is stroked on screen, only 20% as much as a regular pen. The fiber allows for a smoother writing experience on screens, requiring only about half the strength needed to write with regular pens.

Back in Feburary, we introduced another Japanese manufacturer, Hiyoshi Packing Corporation, who leveraged its existing technologies to make sleek card cases. Its core business, in contrast, is auto parts and electronics processing.

Our readers may also recall the Japanese startup Factelier which is collaborating with Japanese factories to bring interesting products to consumers.

Japan’s technological craftsmanship is too precious to fade and die out. So we really hope to see more creativity and inventions such as the Touch Pen Pro, which help old businesses rebound into modern markets.

Touch Pen Pro is currently available to purchase online over on Amazon or on Rakuten for 1,575 yen (or about $15). Check out the video below to see how Akaishi’s tablet pen works.

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Dai Nippon Printing and Onemore launch crowdfunding site for book publication

Junya Mori 2013.12.11

See the original article in Japanese Onemore Inc., the startup behind the crowdfunding platform Green Funding, and one Japan’s leading printing companies, Dai Nippon Printing, have jointly launched a crowdfunding site called Mirai Books Fund. It will specialize in book publication. This Mirai Books Fund is intended to support new publishing projects. The service provides companies and publishers with an online platform that includes all processes required to publish books. This includes planning, fundraising, and a consulting service on marketing and creating books. We have previously reported on a few vertical crowdfunding sites, designed to fill specific needs. For example, other crowdfunding platforms with a similar concept are Cerevo Dash and Zenmono. It is less challenging these days to publish book, since consumption of digital books is on the rise. This crowdfunding platform will make it even easier for individuals to publish a book, and it will also enables users to proceed with fundraising, pre-sales activities, and promotion. On the Mirai Books Fund website, you can check out some of the ongoing projects. One was launched by the crowdsourcing service Lancers, with the goal of publish a magazine-style book. This project will be open from December 5th to January 23rd,…

See the original article in Japanese

Onemore Inc., the startup behind the crowdfunding platform Green Funding, and one Japan’s leading printing companies, Dai Nippon Printing, have jointly launched a crowdfunding site called Mirai Books Fund. It will specialize in book publication.

This Mirai Books Fund is intended to support new publishing projects. The service provides companies and publishers with an online platform that includes all processes required to publish books. This includes planning, fundraising, and a consulting service on marketing and creating books.

We have previously reported on a few vertical crowdfunding sites, designed to fill specific needs. For example, other crowdfunding platforms with a similar concept are Cerevo Dash and Zenmono.

It is less challenging these days to publish book, since consumption of digital books is on the rise. This crowdfunding platform will make it even easier for individuals to publish a book, and it will also enables users to proceed with fundraising, pre-sales activities, and promotion.

On the Mirai Books Fund website, you can check out some of the ongoing projects. One was launched by the crowdsourcing service Lancers, with the goal of publish a magazine-style book. This project will be open from December 5th to January 23rd, with a funding target of 3 million yen ($30,000). The rewards for backers include the right to put ads in the book, tickets for the publication party, and establish collaborative projects with publishers.

For book projects, there is much room for customization, including the ability to offering various rewards. Mirai Books Fund could have an interesting effect on the future of books and the publishing process in Japan. So lets stay tuned to see what happens!

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Japan’s ‘Creative Survey’ proposes a prettier online questionnaire

Rick Martin 2013.12.10

There are more than a few online survey tools on the market these days, including the likes of Survey Monkey and Typeform. But I was curious to discover a new competitor from here in Japan when I attended the recent Techcrunch Tokyo event. It’s called Creative Survey, a name that reflects the services positioning strategy among the competition. There’s currently a four-person team working on Creative Survey, a sort of mini-unit operating within FourDigit, a web solutions and design studio based in Shibuya. The team had been running on a design research product for corporate customers since 2011, but they found they were receiving lots of demand for a lighter, more affordable solution that anyone could use. That prompted them to launch Creative Survey last month, and so far they have 1100 users, experiencing good growth out if the gate. They hope this can continue, with a sort of Dropbox-like referral system among free users, which they hope will kickstart those who can pay. But the challenge ahead will be a difficult one, with stiff competition not only from Survey Monkey, which has about 65,000 users in Japan, but also from market research giant Macromill, which just launched its own…

There are more than a few online survey tools on the market these days, including the likes of Survey Monkey and Typeform. But I was curious to discover a new competitor from here in Japan when I attended the recent Techcrunch Tokyo event. It’s called Creative Survey, a name that reflects the services positioning strategy among the competition.

There’s currently a four-person team working on Creative Survey, a sort of mini-unit operating within FourDigit, a web solutions and design studio based in Shibuya. The team had been running on a design research product for corporate customers since 2011, but they found they were receiving lots of demand for a lighter, more affordable solution that anyone could use. That prompted them to launch Creative Survey last month, and so far they have 1100 users, experiencing good growth out if the gate. They hope this can continue, with a sort of Dropbox-like referral system among free users, which they hope will kickstart those who can pay.

But the challenge ahead will be a difficult one, with stiff competition not only from Survey Monkey, which has about 65,000 users in Japan, but also from market research giant Macromill, which just launched its own online survey tool, Questant, last month.

How does Creative Survey plan to thrive with such stiff competition? The project’s leader Ryo Taguchi emphatically says that they will excel with better design. They showed me some examples of surveys that really made use of their custom background image support, typically with an interface to match. Transitions between questions are really slick, and they are easily viewable on any mobile device.

creative-survey-04 — Automobile survey, slider response

So how does this differ from Typeform then, I wondered, which is another very eye-catching survey solution. Ryo says that while Typeform is a great tool, it cannot really do the kind of high level question logic that Creative Survey can do. I’m a little skeptical that the demographic for this lighter solution will require such complexity, but for those who do need it, it’s good to know that it’s there.

The Creative Survey team has some interesting things in store for the next year, including plans to push their service overseas, likely in the spring of 2014. So stay tuned for more from them in the coming months!

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Japan’s AdInnovation launches performance analytics tool for mobile developers

Masaru Ikeda 2013.12.10

Tokyo-based AdInnovation, a startup providing ad consulting solutions for mobile developers, announced today that it has launched a performance analytics tool. It’s called Hitracking. Instead of conventional tools in this similar space, the new tool is more focused on giving mobile developers all they need to analyze the performance of their app. This means not only ad performance analytics but also what traffic sources best help the app turn a profit. Their project manager, Ryoma Hosokawa, tells me that the tool aims to show you all the ROI (return on investment) metrics for an app, rather than simple ad performance-focused ROI　metrics. This would include overall profit or loss. In a way, the company wants to set app developers free from monetization concerns so that they can concentrate on development. There is also an SDK that can be embedded in your app to track stats. Pricing depends on the number of requests per month, but it is currently available free until the end of February as part of a promotion. According to the AdInnovation consultant Aya Yamada, they will make two key efforts to make this tool better known. One will be publishing a monthly report of mobile app trends, just…

Tokyo-based AdInnovation, a startup providing ad consulting solutions for mobile developers, announced today that it has launched a performance analytics tool. It’s called Hitracking. Instead of conventional tools in this similar space, the new tool is more focused on giving mobile developers all they need to analyze the performance of their app. This means not only ad performance analytics but also what traffic sources best help the app turn a profit.

Their project manager, Ryoma Hosokawa, tells me that the tool aims to show you all the ROI (return on investment) metrics for an app, rather than simple ad performance-focused ROI　metrics. This would include overall profit or loss. In a way, the company wants to set app developers free from monetization concerns so that they can concentrate on development.

There is also an SDK that can be embedded in your app to track stats. Pricing depends on the number of requests per month, but it is currently available free until the end of February as part of a promotion.

According to the AdInnovation consultant Aya Yamada, they will make two key efforts to make this tool better known. One will be publishing a monthly report of mobile app trends, just like what AppAnnie does. The other option is exhibiting their service at as many international showcase events as possible. You will have a chance to meet with them next year at AppsWorld North America (February 5-6, San Francisco), Casual Connect Europe (February 11-13, Amsterdam), and SXSW Interactive (March 7-16, Austin).

The company raised 160 million yen (about $1.6 million) from DBJ Capital, SMBC Venture Capital, and Mitsubishi UFJ Capital back in July.

As for other players in this space, there are services like HasOffers in the US, which secured $9.4 million from Accel Partners in a series A round back in May.

hitracking_dashboard — Hitracking’s dashboard

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CNet Japan Startup Award nominees: Otaku Mode, Freee, Schoo, Coiney

Mona Nomura 2013.12.10

The quality of start-ups nominated for tonight’s CNet Japan Startup Awards is high, and Japanese entrepreneurs are seeking to solve problems on par with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. This is part seven of our preview of the nominees. The rest can be found here. Tokyo Otaku Mode Tokyo Otaku Mode (or TOM) is the 500 Startup graduate that exploded on the startup scene with a massive Facebook presence. The most fascinating part about TOM is how its growth trajectory has been the reverse of most startups. The normal flow goes something like this: a few entrepreneurs have an idea, build their product, then market it. But TOM started out by building a massive Facebook following of millions of fans. Since TOM hit critical mass on Facebook, it has been trying to figure out a problem most entrepreneurs would love to have: Well, we have reach. What’s next? From building iOS and Android apps, to an Etsy-like UGC strategy, it’s been fun watching them stumble uphill. Or as one of their angel investors, Craig Mod, perfectly summed up, “building their shrine”. Freee Like Quickbooks, BodeTree, Xero, Yendo, Zoho, et al., Freee is a cloud based software that helps small businesses with their…

The quality of start-ups nominated for tonight’s CNet Japan Startup Awards is high, and Japanese entrepreneurs are seeking to solve problems on par with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. This is part seven of our preview of the nominees. The rest can be found here.

Tokyo Otaku Mode

Tokyo Otaku Mode (or TOM) is the 500 Startup graduate that exploded on the startup scene with a massive Facebook presence. The most fascinating part about TOM is how its growth trajectory has been the reverse of most startups. The normal flow goes something like this: a few entrepreneurs have an idea, build their product, then market it. But TOM started out by building a massive Facebook following of millions of fans.

Since TOM hit critical mass on Facebook, it has been trying to figure out a problem most entrepreneurs would love to have:

Well, we have reach. What’s next?

From building iOS and Android apps, to an Etsy-like UGC strategy, it’s been fun watching them stumble uphill. Or as one of their angel investors, Craig Mod, perfectly summed up, “building their shrine”.

Freee

Like Quickbooks, BodeTree, Xero, Yendo, Zoho, et al., Freee is a cloud based software that helps small businesses with their accounting. Founded by five-year Google veteran Daisuke Sasaki, who led Google’s small-to-medium sized business marketing in the APAC region, Freee fills a much needed hole in Japan. While working for Google, he realized a there was a huge problem with web-based accounting software, often only working on certain browsers and with a not so friendly user experience.

This year has been a huge year for Freee. They re-branded, raised $27M Series A, and added features and functions to streamline tedious paper-to-digital administrative tasks.

Freee addresses relevant problems for any small- to mid-sized businesses and is building partnerships [1], features, and functions that prove they are one step ahead of their competitors. Recently they added a POS (point of sale) system on their iPad app, and last week they announced a collaboration with receipt tracking app ReceReco to simplify the paper receipt tracking process.

Schoo

From the left: Koizumi, Mori, Nakanishi — Schoo

Schoo is an online learning platform founded by entrepreneurs with editorial backgrounds. Their vision is to encourage other entrepreneurs to be ‘eternal students’ by providing e-learning content focused on the startup and venture world. We recently talked with the founders about their strategy for building a quality e-learning space, and I encourage you to check out that discussion [2].

Coiney

Coiney is the fourth major player in mobile payment solutions along with PayPal Here, Square and Rakuten SmartPay. All four have similar products and strategies. Square and PayPal Here have challenges most US based companies have: localization. Coiney knows and understands the Japanese market as the founder is ex-PayPal Japan.

Rakuten SmartPay’s obstacle is that Rakuten is a massive corporation. In order to quickly gain traction in a highly competitive field like mobile payments, agility is a necessity. If Rakuten SmartPay can figure out how to move and iterate quickly, they will become a major player, as Rakuten Ichiba has existing relationships with small businesses in Japan. Keep in mind that Base is also a mobile payment solution player to be reckoned with, tackling market penetration in a different way [3].

This is definitely one race to keep an eye on.

Good luck to all four finalists tonight at the CNet Japan Startup Awards!

Partnerships with Suica and Seven and i Holdings Co. to track, record, and automate transportation and credit card expenditures. ↩
Read the interview in two parts here and here. ↩
In the interests of disclosure, I should note here that I’m currently employed by Rakuten. ↩

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Skyland Ventures turns its focus to mobile, co-invests in movie-making app

Masaru Ikeda 2013.12.09

See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Skyland Ventures, an investment fund focused on startups, announced it has allocated its 200 million yen (approximately $2 million) fund to invest in smartphone app developers. The fund is expected to be finishing investments by next June. You may recall our recent article citing analyst’s prediction that about 60% of Japanese mobile users will switch to smartphones by 2014. Since cheaper smartphone handsets will be more easily available to many consumers, this shift will of course occur in other parts of the world as well. Obviously for Skyland, getting on board with this trend makes sense. Coinciding with this announcement, the group also disclosed its investment in Japanese mobile development startup Nanameue, which also received investment from East Ventures to the tune of 30 million yen ($300,000) [1]. The startup was launched back in May by Atsushi Takishima and Takahiro Ishihama. The pair previously worked with Japanese startup Quan, known for its apps targeting the Southeast Asian region. SlideStory, one of Nanameue’s apps, has already surpassed 400,000 downloads, with users mainly in Japan, Thailand, and Taiwan. The total downloads across all 12 of their apps has reached over 2.3 million. SlideStory allows you…

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Skyland Ventures, an investment fund focused on startups, announced it has allocated its 200 million yen (approximately $2 million) fund to invest in smartphone app developers. The fund is expected to be finishing investments by next June.

You may recall our recent article citing analyst’s prediction that about 60% of Japanese mobile users will switch to smartphones by 2014. Since cheaper smartphone handsets will be more easily available to many consumers, this shift will of course occur in other parts of the world as well. Obviously for Skyland, getting on board with this trend makes sense.

Coinciding with this announcement, the group also disclosed its investment in Japanese mobile development startup Nanameue, which also received investment from East Ventures to the tune of 30 million yen ($300,000) ^[1].

The startup was launched back in May by Atsushi Takishima and Takahiro Ishihama. The pair previously worked with Japanese startup Quan, known for its apps targeting the Southeast Asian region. SlideStory, one of Nanameue’s apps, has already surpassed 400,000 downloads, with users mainly in Japan, Thailand, and Taiwan.

The total downloads across all 12 of their apps has reached over 2.3 million.

SlideStory allows you to create a movie clip from 15 still images, or you can also create a clip of up to 32 seconds by splicing multiple clips. Its functionality resembles Korea’s Tripvi Album or Honda Motor’s RoadMovies app.

East Ventures is also a limited partner for Skyland Ventures.↩

News

A mobile Q&A service finally done right? Meet Line Q

Japanese social illustration service Pixiv launches e-commerce platform for creators

Popular Japanese code learning platform ‘Dotinstall’ launches premium service

Madrid’s IE Business School and Keio University hold joint entrepreneur event in Tokyo