See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Talknote, the startup behind the corporate communication platform of the same name, announced today it has raised 200 million yen (approximately $2 million) from Japanese investment company Lead Capital Management. Prior to this funding, it had raised an undisclosed sum of investment from CyberAgent Ventures back in March of 2012. The platform was initially launched as an instant messaging tool for restaurants back in February of 2010, but switched to become a corporate communication platform for businesses in general back in June of 2011. It had over 5,000 corporate users as of last March, but since then its growth has accelerated surpassing 10,000 accounts this month (see chart below). We asked the Talknote founder and CEO, Haruo Koike, about their possible exit options, and he explained: We obviously aim for an IPO exit. A merger or acquisition will be not included in our options. Google Apps has 5 million corporate users worldwide, and Kanjo Bugyo (Japan’s dominant corporate accounting software) has 500,000 users. … This space is fiercely competitive and not many platforms can survive. But I think the ones that stand out can grow to such a level. The company has plans…
Tokyo-based Talknote, the startup behind the corporate communication platform of the same name, announced today it has raised 200 million yen (approximately $2 million) from Japanese investment company Lead Capital Management. Prior to this funding, it had raised an undisclosed sum of investment from CyberAgent Ventures back in March of 2012.
The platform was initially launched as an instant messaging tool for restaurants back in February of 2010, but switched to become a corporate communication platform for businesses in general back in June of 2011. It had over 5,000 corporate users as of last March, but since then its growth has accelerated surpassing 10,000 accounts this month (see chart below).
We asked the Talknote founder and CEO, Haruo Koike, about their possible exit options, and he explained:
We obviously aim for an IPO exit. A merger or acquisition will be not included in our options. Google Apps has 5 million corporate users worldwide, and Kanjo Bugyo (Japan’s dominant corporate accounting software) has 500,000 users. … This space is fiercely competitive and not many platforms can survive. But I think the ones that stand out can grow to such a level.
The company has plans to enhance its messaging feature enabling users to communicate with their clients as well as their colleagues. He added:
We think a communication platform for colleagues is the only first step of our concept. We will introduce an API and encourage other developers to integrate it with their systems. For example, this may enable users to share their daily sales updates with their employees, which can be done automatically every day.
Talknote is expecting to acquire 100,000 corporate users in the next three years.
See the original story in Japanese. In Japan, travel and leisure-related portals have been on the rise recently. Keeping with that trend, Tokyo-based Catarizm, the startup behind online leisure booking site Asoview, announced on Friday that it has partnered with Yahoo Travel, the travel-focused arm of Yahoo Japan. Since its launch back in April of 2013, Asoview has been providing booking services for skydiving, rafting, and other weekend leisure activities. Users are allowed to choose and book an activity out of the 1,500 programs available from the startup’s 460 partners. One of the remarkable aspects of the company’s launch was the involvement of Takao Ozawa. He is a serial entrepreneur who launched second-hand book and video marketplace EasySeek [1], established a professional baseball team at Rakuten, and invested in many emerging startups like Star Festival, Nanapi, and Tokyo Otaku Mode. He sold his social marketing agency Crocos to Yahoo Japan back in August of 2012, and joined YJ Capital (the investment arm of Yahoo Japan) to help cultivate its investment and e-commerce businesses. The company’s CEO, Tomohisa Yamano, reflected on when he met Ozawa for the first time: I knew him through a friend of mine when I launched the website. He…
In Japan, travel and leisure-related portals have been on the rise recently. Keeping with that trend, Tokyo-based Catarizm, the startup behind online leisure booking site Asoview, announced on Friday that it has partnered with Yahoo Travel, the travel-focused arm of Yahoo Japan.
Since its launch back in April of 2013, Asoview has been providing booking services for skydiving, rafting, and other weekend leisure activities. Users are allowed to choose and book an activity out of the 1,500 programs available from the startup’s 460 partners.
One of the remarkable aspects of the company’s launch was the involvement of Takao Ozawa. He is a serial entrepreneur who launched second-hand book and video marketplace EasySeek [1], established a professional baseball team at Rakuten, and invested in many emerging startups like Star Festival, Nanapi, and Tokyo Otaku Mode. He sold his social marketing agency Crocos to Yahoo Japan back in August of 2012, and joined YJ Capital (the investment arm of Yahoo Japan) to help cultivate its investment and e-commerce businesses.
The company’s CEO, Tomohisa Yamano, reflected on when he met Ozawa for the first time:
I knew him through a friend of mine when I launched the website. He seemed to like me, and I joined his community of entrepreneurs. Obviously, I’ve got lots of advice from him. In the worst case, he said he could help me get employed in the bottled water business if the company failed.
Yamano previously worked with Recruit, a Japanese human resource and web service company which operates various booking sites. There he proposed the concept of a leisure booking site similar to Asoview, but it was not adopted. Perhaps they thought the market was too small or might conflict with their existing businesses.
Helping consumers enjoy their weekends
We featured PlayLife a week ago, which is another service that helps Japanese people find their leisure plans. When asked how his service is different, Yamano explained:
I decided to launch a travel-focused service at first, but it was unlikely to really address a need in the space because of many travel booking sites/apps available. Then I conducted a survey of 100 persons, and I recognized there’s a huge demand in helping them find what to do and where to visit at travel destinations.
However, several months ago, there were very few websites focused on niche leisure activities like rafting. Consumers were forced to rely on fragmented information resources such as blogs. Yamano recognized consumers need to find ways to enjoy their weekends, and started preparing for the website by partnering with 37 recreation planners and organizers. He says that their available options vary from outdoor activities to unusual experiences such as rides on a rickshaw, a limo, or a helicopter. He expected to acquire 1,000 orders a season at most, but it has already surpassed 5,000 orders to date.
What Asoview provides is similar to Japanese private lesson marketplace Cyta.jp. While there are many difficulties in a niche, commission-based business, Yamano told us their average sales price is 24,000 yen ($240), higher than that of major hotel booking sites.
Subsequently acquired back in 2002 by Rakuten for about $13 million.↩
See the original story in Japanese. SmartNews is one of the many popular news apps available to Japanese consumers these days. The startup (of the same name) announced yesterday that it has surpassed 2 million news subscriptions on its Channel Plus service, which it launched back in May to provide updates from partnering news media [1]. It has partnered with 54 media presences across 36 companies, including blogs, tech media (you can find The Bridge there), business magazines, newspapers, news agencies and more. Channels typically have 100,000 subscribers on average, with Gizmodo Japan boasting the most of all with 180,000 subscribers currently. The company has yet to make its business profitable, but will focus on intensifying partnerships with media companies for now, and then look to monetize later on. Many of our readers may recall that the startup raised $4.2 million from Globis Capital Partners back in August. They recently moved to a new location and rebranded from their previous name of Gocro. They explain that subscriptions are not unique subscribers, since one user could have multiple subscriptions to various media. ↩
SmartNews is one of the many popular news apps available to Japanese consumers these days. The startup (of the same name) announced yesterday that it has surpassed 2 million news subscriptions on its Channel Plus service, which it launched back in May to provide updates from partnering news media [1].
It has partnered with 54 media presences across 36 companies, including blogs, tech media (you can find The Bridge there), business magazines, newspapers, news agencies and more. Channels typically have 100,000 subscribers on average, with Gizmodo Japan boasting the most of all with 180,000 subscribers currently.
The company has yet to make its business profitable, but will focus on intensifying partnerships with media companies for now, and then look to monetize later on. Many of our readers may recall that the startup raised $4.2 million from Globis Capital Partners back in August. They recently moved to a new location and rebranded from their previous name of Gocro.
They explain that subscriptions are not unique subscribers, since one user could have multiple subscriptions to various media. ↩
See the original story in Japanese. It’s been three months since I visited Luxembourg for ICT Spring 2013. Interestingly one Japanese startup, Skeed, recently launched an office there as its base for their service expansions in the European region. Skeed is a Tokyo-based startup focused on developing a high-speed data transmission technology [1]. The company is perhaps best known for its SSBP (Skeed Silver Bullet) Protocol, which optimizes the delivery of file and data transfer between multiple locations. Since the technology will not put a heavy processing load on your PC or mobile, it makes it easier for potential clients to adopt it. It can also compensate for the inherent shortcomings of TCP and improve transmission efficiency better than conventional FTP-based file transfers. So it provides great value for mobile carriers or internet service providers, which often struggle with bandwidth congestion. This SSBP technology was originally developed by Dr. Isamu Kaneko, known for having developed P2P-based file sharing software Winny. Readers may remember that he suddenly passed away back in July. Authorities harassed him for this file sharing software, but his technology was reborn as a solution to underlie the rich media era. Mobile gaming developers these days are paying…
It’s been three months since I visited Luxembourg for ICT Spring 2013. Interestingly one Japanese startup, Skeed, recently launched an office there as its base for their service expansions in the European region. Skeed is a Tokyo-based startup focused on developing a high-speed data transmission technology [1].
The company is perhaps best known for its SSBP (Skeed Silver Bullet) Protocol, which optimizes the delivery of file and data transfer between multiple locations. Since the technology will not put a heavy processing load on your PC or mobile, it makes it easier for potential clients to adopt it. It can also compensate for the inherent shortcomings of TCP and improve transmission efficiency better than conventional FTP-based file transfers. So it provides great value for mobile carriers or internet service providers, which often struggle with bandwidth congestion.
This SSBP technology was originally developed by Dr. Isamu Kaneko, known for having developed P2P-based file sharing software Winny. Readers may remember that he suddenly passed away back in July. Authorities harassed him for this file sharing software, but his technology was reborn as a solution to underlie the rich media era.
Mobile gaming developers these days are paying special attention to new technologies that can help their traffic mitigation efforts. We can expect many of them start using the startup’s technology in their mobile apps or gaming platforms very soon.
Skeed’s pitch at ICT Spring 2013 (by Nariaki Hatta)
Among the Japanese startups which participated in the event, Anydoor (known for crowdsourced translation service Conyac) and Chatwork (knowledge sharing tool for business) have already announced intention to launch their offices in Luxembourg.↩
A few weeks back we mentioned Japan’s Community Factory, a company acquired by Yahoo Japan a year ago, which produces a number of cute/kawaii apps for smartphones. The most notable of these apps is its Decopic app, but the company aspires to overrun your entire homescreen with uber-pink cuteness. Community Factory’s latest hit is Petatto Memo, a memo application that lets you pin cute little notes (in the form of web shortcut icons) to your homescreen as visible reminders of things you have to do. This is admittedly a somewhat crude approach to task management, with so many great to-do and reminder apps out there. But for people out there who want something that stays in their face, these homescreen reminders will certainly do the trick. Even after you type the text into your memo and pit it, you can edit it at a later date if you choose. There are over 300 varieties of cute memos to choose from, so there’s lots of room for creativity. Personally, I think the adding/editing process is maybe a little clumsy, but I guess that’s the sacrifice you make for getting a visible note pinned to your homescreen [1]. Currently Petatto Memo is…
A few weeks back we mentioned Japan’s Community Factory, a company acquired by Yahoo Japan a year ago, which produces a number of cute/kawaii apps for smartphones. The most notable of these apps is its Decopic app, but the company aspires to overrun your entire homescreen with uber-pink cuteness.
Community Factory’s latest hit is Petatto Memo, a memo application that lets you pin cute little notes (in the form of web shortcut icons) to your homescreen as visible reminders of things you have to do.
This is admittedly a somewhat crude approach to task management, with so many great to-do and reminder apps out there. But for people out there who want something that stays in their face, these homescreen reminders will certainly do the trick.
Even after you type the text into your memo and pit it, you can edit it at a later date if you choose. There are over 300 varieties of cute memos to choose from, so there’s lots of room for creativity. Personally, I think the adding/editing process is maybe a little clumsy, but I guess that’s the sacrifice you make for getting a visible note pinned to your homescreen [1].
Currently Petatto Memo is the third ranked free app in the Japanese app store, and is number one in the Lifestyle category. It’s sister app, Petatto Calendar, is number four in the Lifestyle Calender, and ladies who enjoy the memo app might want to try that as well.
I tend to scoff at these super cute apps sometimes. But it’s hard to ignore the fact that they are pretty big business here in Japan, and are turning out to be a very exportable part of Japan’s mobile content industry. ↩
With the spreading popularity of smartphones, we’re transitioning many aspects of our lives to digital. This is mostly true for daily task management too, but in Japan physical daily planner books have a strong following too. At around this time of the year, if you go to variety shops like Loft or Tokyu Hands, there is as much as half a floor dedicated to these paper planners for the coming year. One paper planner in high demand is ‘Hobo-nichi-techo’, which roughly translates to ‘Just about everyday planner’. This paper planner sold over 480,000 units last year alone, and has nabbed the number top spot in Loft’s paper planner genre for nine years consecutive. Behind this popular planner is a very well-known copy-writer and cultural figure, Shigesato Itoi. His writings and other creative works have inspired many people in this country, and it was back in 2002 that he designed this paper planner. His famous attention to detail is definitely evident in this planner. It stays open no matter which page you’re on, and it uses special paper for a smooth writing experience. On the bottom of each page (each day has its own page) there are quotes from Itoi. Hobo-nichi-techo…
With the spreading popularity of smartphones, we’re transitioning many aspects of our lives to digital. This is mostly true for daily task management too, but in Japan physical daily planner books have a strong following too. At around this time of the year, if you go to variety shops like Loft or Tokyu Hands, there is as much as half a floor dedicated to these paper planners for the coming year.
One paper planner in high demand is ‘Hobo-nichi-techo’, which roughly translates to ‘Just about everyday planner’. This paper planner sold over 480,000 units last year alone, and has nabbed the number top spot in Loft’s paper planner genre for nine years consecutive.
Behind this popular planner is a very well-known copy-writer and cultural figure, Shigesato Itoi. His writings and other creative works have inspired many people in this country, and it was back in 2002 that he designed this paper planner. His famous attention to detail is definitely evident in this planner. It stays open no matter which page you’re on, and it uses special paper for a smooth writing experience. On the bottom of each page (each day has its own page) there are quotes from Itoi.
Hobo-nichi-techo recently made its first promotional video, which was created by Yugo Nakamura, a famous interface designer also behind a hot Japanese startup Sumally.
The people that appear in the video are the actual users of the planner, and the resulting video is pretty magical. The many types of this popular planner can be found over on the official online shop.
Tokyo-based Luxa, the startup running a members-only discount e-commerce platform, has announced today that it has raised 330 million yen ($3.3 million) from KDDI Open Innovation Fund, the fund operated by Japanese telco KDDI. Prior to this funding, the company raised a total of investment worth over $10 million from Japanese investment company Jafco. Coinciding with these new funds, Luxa plans to provide limited-offer discounts to mobile subscribers via au SmartPass, the telco’s flat-rate app subscription program. Since its initial launch back in August of 2010, the website has acquired over 450,000 members, mostly people in their 30s and 40s. Their products are wide-ranging, with a heavy slant towards cosmetics and appliances. The company claims that its smartphone access ratio has risen from 8% to 35%, which indicates a rapid transition of users from desktop to mobile both in revenue and traffic [1]. With this new partnership with KDDI, the startup expects to boost its user base to 4.5 million by the end of 2016. KDDI also revealed that it has invested in iRidge, the startup behind an O2O (online-to-offline) solution using mobile geolocation and notification features. The investment sum was undisclosed. This year, the telco has invested in several…
Tokyo-based Luxa, the startup running a members-only discount e-commerce platform, has announced today that it has raised 330 million yen ($3.3 million) from KDDI Open Innovation Fund, the fund operated by Japanese telco KDDI. Prior to this funding, the company raised a total of investment worth over $10 million from Japanese investment company Jafco. Coinciding with these new funds, Luxa plans to provide limited-offer discounts to mobile subscribers via au SmartPass, the telco’s flat-rate app subscription program.
Luxa’s storefront for KDDI mobile subscribers only
Since its initial launch back in August of 2010, the website has acquired over 450,000 members, mostly people in their 30s and 40s. Their products are wide-ranging, with a heavy slant towards cosmetics and appliances.
The company claims that its smartphone access ratio has risen from 8% to 35%, which indicates a rapid transition of users from desktop to mobile both in revenue and traffic [1]. With this new partnership with KDDI, the startup expects to boost its user base to 4.5 million by the end of 2016.
KDDI also revealed that it has invested in iRidge, the startup behind an O2O (online-to-offline) solution using mobile geolocation and notification features. The investment sum was undisclosed.
This year, the telco has invested in several other e-commerce startups, including Origami and Monoco. This indicates how the company plans to leverage its huge user base, developing an entirely new revenue stream, making it more than a conventional dumb pipe business.
See the original story in Japanese. Many of us enjoy taking mobile snapshots every day, and here in Japan this tendency has helped photobook services, such as Mixi’s Nohana, to become popular among consumers. Thanks to advanced printing technologies and photo shooting techniques, now we have more ways than ever to enjoy our photos. Tokyo-based startup O.N.A.R (apparently pronounced ‘One R’) recently launched a service called Niiice (apparently pronounced ‘Naaieece’) which lets you order photo tiles made from your smartphone snapshots. In this space, we’ve already seen many startups enabling users to print their own original creations using Instagram photos (see Casetagram for iPhone cases and Snaptee for T-shirts). The company plans to target consumers who want to keep their memories in a physical form nearby. And these tiles do just that. They come in small, medium, and large sizes. The small size has a magnet on the back, and the medium and large sizes come with a hook that will let you hang it on your wall. The original intention was for these tiles to be used for pet photos or to celebrate a birth. But they’ve found users are creating tiles as presents for parents or loved ones…
Many of us enjoy taking mobile snapshots every day, and here in Japan this tendency has helped photobook services, such as Mixi’s Nohana, to become popular among consumers. Thanks to advanced printing technologies and photo shooting techniques, now we have more ways than ever to enjoy our photos.
Tokyo-based startup O.N.A.R (apparently pronounced ‘One R’) recently launched a service called Niiice (apparently pronounced ‘Naaieece’) which lets you order photo tiles made from your smartphone snapshots.
In this space, we’ve already seen many startups enabling users to print their own original creations using Instagram photos (see Casetagram for iPhone cases and Snaptee for T-shirts). The company plans to target consumers who want to keep their memories in a physical form nearby. And these tiles do just that.
They come in small, medium, and large sizes. The small size has a magnet on the back, and the medium and large sizes come with a hook that will let you hang it on your wall. The original intention was for these tiles to be used for pet photos or to celebrate a birth. But they’ve found users are creating tiles as presents for parents or loved ones too.
The startup’s CEO Shunsuke Nakakariya says:
We hope our users can fill their walls with our tiles. But since people already have many small articles in their rooms, there might not be much space for new items. So we think users can start tile decoration using a small space on surface of a fridge, for example.
The startup targets users in the photobook market and hopes to catch up with Nohana in its number of total app downloads. Their service is currently available for the iOS, and an Android version will follow soon. Check out the picture below using our company logo!
While the Japanese mobile gaming space can be quite formulaic at times, I can’t help but like many of the titles that it produces. The puzzle/RPG approach that has worked so well for Puzzle & Dragons is also used in other games we have covered like Tetris Monsters or Puzzle Trooper [1]. And this week, the top iOS game in Japan continues this tradition, this time combining the familiar match–3 puzzle mechanic with horse racing of all things. Yes, say hello to Puzzle Derby. The game is developed by Net Dreamers, and it contains most of the familiar elements of Puzzle & Dragons and other games from that mold. You play a race as a sequence of rounds, matching colored orbs to boost past your opponents, playing to the strength of the horses in your deck. If you can pull off elaborate combos you stand a good chance of winning. There’s also a ‘gacha’ feature that lets you roll for new horse cards in the hopes of finding a rare one. Campaigns and events occur regularly as well, just as they do in Puzzle & Dragons. Initially launched on September 28, the game is only available in Japanese. It has…
While the Japanese mobile gaming space can be quite formulaic at times, I can’t help but like many of the titles that it produces. The puzzle/RPG approach that has worked so well for Puzzle & Dragons is also used in other games we have covered like Tetris Monsters or Puzzle Trooper[1]. And this week, the top iOS game in Japan continues this tradition, this time combining the familiar match–3 puzzle mechanic with horse racing of all things.
The game is developed by Net Dreamers, and it contains most of the familiar elements of Puzzle & Dragons and other games from that mold. You play a race as a sequence of rounds, matching colored orbs to boost past your opponents, playing to the strength of the horses in your deck. If you can pull off elaborate combos you stand a good chance of winning.
There’s also a ‘gacha’ feature that lets you roll for new horse cards in the hopes of finding a rare one. Campaigns and events occur regularly as well, just as they do in Puzzle & Dragons.
Initially launched on September 28, the game is only available in Japanese. It has fared well in the iOS sports category since its launch, but suddenly surged to become the top free game and overall app in Japan on Wednesday, where it currently sits right now.
Whether any these games are actually an RPG in the strict sense of the term is, of course, very debatable. ↩
See the original story in Japanese. This is a part of our coverage of B Dash Camp Osaka 2013. Here in Japan we’ve recently seen several efforts to connect startups and established companies, like Morning Pitch and Creww’s Ignition Night. In Japan, most incubation programs run by corporate venture capital initiatives aim to let their employees understand the startup culture and get a sense of the creative atmosphere. So in this way, established companies and startups can complement each other, and such efforts will likely be more frequent across the local startup scene. On a day two of B Dash Camp in Osaka last week, we heard more on this topic from Microsoft Japan evengelist Shinichiro Isago, NTT Docomo Ventures managing director Daisuke Miyoshi, and Dentsu [1] senior director Fumijiko Nakajima. This session was moderated by Shuji Honjo, visiting professor at Tama Graduate School of Business, Tokyo. According to Nakajima, Dentsu focuses on three factors when partnering with startups: ideas, entrepreneurship, and technology. Under a well-known project dubbed Neurowear, the company has developed several products like as Nekomimi and Miko, which were also exhibited at SXSW back in March. His team is currently exploring business models for these products. He…
Here in Japan we’ve recently seen several efforts to connect startups and established companies, like Morning Pitch and Creww’s Ignition Night. In Japan, most incubation programs run by corporate venture capital initiatives aim to let their employees understand the startup culture and get a sense of the creative atmosphere.
So in this way, established companies and startups can complement each other, and such efforts will likely be more frequent across the local startup scene. On a day two of B Dash Camp in Osaka last week, we heard more on this topic from Microsoft Japan evengelist Shinichiro Isago, NTT Docomo Ventures managing director Daisuke Miyoshi, and Dentsu [1] senior director Fumijiko Nakajima. This session was moderated by Shuji Honjo, visiting professor at Tama Graduate School of Business, Tokyo.
Dentsu’s Fumihiko Nakajima
According to Nakajima, Dentsu focuses on three factors when partnering with startups: ideas, entrepreneurship, and technology. Under a well-known project dubbed Neurowear, the company has developed several products like as Nekomimi and Miko, which were also exhibited at SXSW back in March. His team is currently exploring business models for these products.
He also shared some of the projects that the company is working on in collaboration with other companies:
Draffic: Developed in association with Japanese GIS company Zenrin Datacom, this system visualizes how many people were located in a specific time at a specific location. It is expected to be used by local governments to consider a disaster evacuation plan.
Asoberu-T: Developed in association with Japanese fashion retailer Beams, this solution lets users experience augmented reality on T-shirts. We featured this product back in July.
Social Marathon: Using RFID technology, this service collects time lapses of runners at a marathon and automatically publish their updates via social networks to more motivate them to keep running.
Dentsu Science Jam: This is a joint venture with Japanese web conglomerate Digital Garage, aiming to create commercial services based on cutting-edge research in science.
draffic
According to Miyoshi, NTT Docomo Ventures aims for capital gain, but for startups, they expect to be seen as a gateway to all NTT group companies.
At a huge conglomerate like NTT Group, you may have no idea how to connect with a certain department. We will find the right person in the right department, corresponding to what you’re looking for, and link you up with them. We will work with you to explore how a department can make the most of your technology.
Since our company is a mobile carrier, we tend to be more constrained, so we will need more time to launch a new business than a typical startup does. By collaborating with startups which typically have lots of knowledge about new businesses, we would like to accelerate our internal entrepreneurial efforts as well.
One of the trends popular with our executives currently is the health care business. If you can bring us a health care solution, we can probably explore a potential business partnership.
For startups from outside Japan, they welcome any types of your approach. But they highly recommend you to visit them with a Japanese interpreter.
Microsoft’s Shinichiro Isago
Microsoft launched Microsoft Ventures from its US headquarters back in July. And Microsoft Japan is preparing to launch its Japanese counterpart, providing startups with support such as BizSpark, an acceleration program, and seed funding opportunities ranging from 5 million yen to 30 million yen (from $50,000 to $300,000).
In a response to a question about what kind of startups they can support, Microsoft’s Isago shared an interesting story:
In Saga prefecture, the local government decided to distribute our tablets to all high school students in the prefecture. … Our challenge is we have little variety of apps for Windows Tablets. So we really want to support startups which can provide a variety of apps for devices.
For startups, if you want to apply for Microsoft’s incubation program, you will be requested to submit a form in English, as they are a global company. Microsoft Japan can give you translation assistance, but they recommend you to personally write about what has motivated you to launch a startup, regardless of whether your English is good or not.
Moderator Honjo praised the the panelists for helping their respective companies connect with startups. In response, Microsoft’s Isago explained why.
It’s because big companies became weaker. In the past at many companies, smarter people tend to be assigned to high profit business. But for communicating with startups, you will need to be agile and responsive. Supporting startups will not help profits so much, but taking these actions with our future in mind is a good policy.
Disclosure: The author has a business relationship with Dentsu.↩
Takeshi Hirano
Junya Mori
Masaru Ikeda
Rick Martin
Yukari Mitsuhashi
