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Cloud-based invoicing startup MakeLeaps wins IE-KMD Venture Day in Tokyo

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See the original story in Japanese. Madrid’s IE Business School and the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University (KMD) jointly held their second Venture Day event for entrepreneurs in Tokyo. This year’s event took place at Keio Mita Campus and attracted a large audience of investors, entrepreneurs, and mentors from Japan and Europe. See also: Madrid’s IE Business School and Keio University hold joint entrepreneur event in Tokyo While 10 teams from Europe, Japan, and KMD students competed in a pitch session, Tokyo-based MakeLeaps, a startup that provides a cloud-based invoicing solution, won the top prize. As we have seen familiar faces of MakeLeaps’ people at many events in the local startup scene, it would be better to call them an authority rather than a startup. However, in view of the small number of B2B startups providing SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions in Tokyo, MakeLeaps has been boldly challenging and aiming to better serve local businesses, which won over the judges. MakeLeaps fundraised $600,000 from 500 Startups and AngelList in August. MakeLeaps CEO Jason Winder said they are planning to integrate other services like customer relationship management next year. Makeleaps’ won two roundtrip tickets between Tokyo and…

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See the original story in Japanese.

Madrid’s IE Business School and the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University (KMD) jointly held their second Venture Day event for entrepreneurs in Tokyo. This year’s event took place at Keio Mita Campus and attracted a large audience of investors, entrepreneurs, and mentors from Japan and Europe.

See also:

While 10 teams from Europe, Japan, and KMD students competed in a pitch session, Tokyo-based MakeLeaps, a startup that provides a cloud-based invoicing solution, won the top prize. As we have seen familiar faces of MakeLeaps’ people at many events in the local startup scene, it would be better to call them an authority rather than a startup. However, in view of the small number of B2B startups providing SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions in Tokyo, MakeLeaps has been boldly challenging and aiming to better serve local businesses, which won over the judges.

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MakeLeaps CEO Jason Winder (left) receiving prizes.

MakeLeaps fundraised $600,000 from 500 Startups and AngelList in August. MakeLeaps CEO Jason Winder said they are planning to integrate other services like customer relationship management next year.

Makeleaps’ won two roundtrip tickets between Tokyo and Madrid from Turkish Airlines, as well as a complimentary three-month residency at Venture Generation, a co-working and incubation space near Tokyo station.

2nd prize winner: Wovn.io

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Jeff Sandford, co-founder of Minimal Technologies, the company behind Wovn.io (left)

Wovn.io provides multilingual support for your website or blog, bringing your content to the world. Site visitors can quickly toggle between languages using the Wovn.io widget. All editing and management of your translated content can be done from the convenience of your browser. By adding a single JavaScript code to a website source, Wovn.io instantly turns a website into a multilingual environment. It is available in 11 languages including Chinese, English, and French.

According to co-founder Jeff Sandford, almost 70% of Internet users in the world are non-English speakers. Operators of websites in English can reach almost double the number of users by turning their website into a multilingual environment. Wovn.io has translated six million web pages to date. Some 30% of their users are in the US and 29% are in Japan.

Wovn.io won a roundtrip ticket between Tokyo and Madrid from Turkish Airlines, as well as a complimentary three-month residency at Venture Generation.

3rd prize winner: Breezy not Wheezy

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The ‘Breezy not Wheezy’ team

The Breezy not Wheezy team was selected from a KMD session. Asthma is a common affliction among children around the world. One of the co-founders of Breezy not Wheezy has suffered from it since she was a child, and this inspired the team to develop Breezy not Wheezy.

A peak flow meter is a device used to measure lung air flow and is effective for asthma management. The Breezy not Wheezy team connected a peak flow meter to a smartphone to record peak patterns on the cloud. This information will help parents to better manage their child’s asthma by leveraging a med companion connected to the solution.

Breezy not Wheezy won a complimentary three-month residency at Venture Generation.

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IE Business School is headquartered in Mardid, Spain, and it is counted as one of top five business schools in line up with other institutions like INSEAD in France. Their Venture Day events have seen a rapid worldwide expansion, being held in over 20 countries to date, with 16 events in 2014 alone.

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

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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…

iekmd-ventureday-poster

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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

The next step in augmented reality: Electrify your taste buds

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This week I had a chance to visit Dr. Adrian Cheok and his students at the Mixed Reality Lab at Keio University. The research they’re conducting is based around the notion that in the future technology will shift from today’s ‘Information Age’ to an ‘Experience Age’. Dr. Cheok predicts that we will experience the realities of other people, as opposed to just reading about them, listening to them, or watching a video on a glass screen. Visiting the Mixed Reality Lab was a refreshing experience. I’ve come to associate terms like ‘Augmented Reality’ with things like Sekai Camera, or the fascinating human Pac-man game that his lab created a few years back [1]. But Dr. Cheok points out quite rightfully – and perhaps surprisingly – that one of the earliest examples of AR was Sony’s Walkman, the first device that allowed people to have their own personal sounds with them all the time. Beyond Sound and Vision Once we accept the idea that augmented/mixed-reality is not just limited to vision, then it opens up a whole world of possibilities. And these are the possibilities that Dr. Cheok and his students are researching. He explains: I became interested to see if…

This week I had a chance to visit Dr. Adrian Cheok and his students at the Mixed Reality Lab at Keio University. The research they’re conducting is based around the notion that in the future technology will shift from today’s ‘Information Age’ to an ‘Experience Age’. Dr. Cheok predicts that we will experience the realities of other people, as opposed to just reading about them, listening to them, or watching a video on a glass screen.

Visiting the Mixed Reality Lab was a refreshing experience. I’ve come to associate terms like ‘Augmented Reality’ with things like Sekai Camera, or the fascinating human Pac-man game that his lab created a few years back [1]. But Dr. Cheok points out quite rightfully – and perhaps surprisingly – that one of the earliest examples of AR was Sony’s Walkman, the first device that allowed people to have their own personal sounds with them all the time.

Beyond Sound and Vision

Once we accept the idea that augmented/mixed-reality is not just limited to vision, then it opens up a whole world of possibilities. And these are the possibilities that Dr. Cheok and his students are researching. He explains:

I became interested to see if we could extend augmented reality to other senses. To touch. At first I made a system for human-to-pet communication. We made a jacket for a chicken that allowed a person to convey touch to a chicken remotely. Then we made Huggy Pajama, which could be used to hug a child remotely [2].

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Ring-u

While projects like this might strike us as a little strange — or even wacky — it’s important to note that such projects can be far more practical than you might think at first glance. A version of Huggy Pajama called T Jacket has been subsequently developed for for therapeudic purposes. So for example, a child with autism could be comforted remotely with hugs can be sent over the internet by smartphone.

Readers may recall that we previously featured another remarkable haptic communication project from the Mixed Reality Lab called Ring-u. The idea here is that vibrating messages can be sent over the internet, back and forth between a pair of rings, and there is also now a smartphone interface for the ring as well. This project has perhaps far larger potential in the consumer electronics space, and they’re speaking with toy companies and high-end jewelers about possibile future developments.

Taste the Future

But perhaps the biggest challenge for Dr. Cheok and his team is figuring out how to digitize the other two remaining senses:

Smell and taste are the least explored areas because they usually require chemicals. [But] we think they are important because they can directly affect emotion, mood, and memory, even in a subconscious way. But currently its difficult because things are still analog. This is like it was for music before the CD came along.

Amazingly the team has developed a prototype electric taste machine, and I was lucky to be able to try it out during my visit. The device in its current form is a small box with two protruding metal strips, between which you insert your tongue to experience a variety of tastes. For me some were stronger than others, with lemon and spicy being the strongest. It works by using electric current and temperature to communicate taste, and I experienced what felt like a fraction of the intended tastes – but very impressive. I’m told that in the future, this system could even assume a lollipop-like form, which would certainly be very interesting.

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Electric taste machine

The lab is also collaborating with Japanese startup ChatPerf, which you may recognize as the company that developed a smell-producing attachment for smartphones. They will also conduct a formal academic study to see to what level smell can affect communication between individuals. But even with ChatPerf, the creation of smells is still analog, using cartridges of liquid to emit odors. Later on Dr. Cheok hopes to similate smells in a non-chemical, digital way, noting that it can be done via magnetic stimulation of the olfactory bulb.

So while experiments like these tend to cause lots of laughs and raised eyebrows sometimes, the work is quite important in expanding how we see technology’s role in our lives.

These are just a few of the great projects that the Mixed Reality Lab is working on, and we hope to tell you about others in the future.


  1. It’s pretty amazing that they made this way back in 2009.  ↩

  2. For more information on this fun huggable chicken project, check out Adrian Cheok: Making a Huggable Internet over on IEEE Spectrum. A demo of Huggy Pajama can be found here.  ↩

One ring to hug them all: RingU gives your partner a squeeze over the net

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Professor Adrian Cheok of Keio University’s Mixed Reality Lab has been a pioneer in blending the internet and the physical world, producing creations like Petimo, which allows kids to send hugs to each other over the internet; and Huggy Pajama, a similar solution for kids whose parent might be away. Projects from Mixed Reality Lab emphasize the importance of physical touch in a world where communication is drifting away from that particular sense. Professor Cheok now has a new project in the works that iterates on this philosophy of blending physical touch with the internet. The RingU is another device that transmits these internet hugs, but it does so in a far more compact device. Using a ring connected to your smartphone by Bluetooth, signals can be sent to a paired ring over the internet. You can see a quick overview of RingU in the video below. When you want to communicate a sort of virtual hug to your partner — and it could be a family member, a lover, or just a good friend — you squeese the ring, and your partner will receive this ‘tele-hug’ in real time. So even when separated by huge distances, you know that…

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Professor Adrian Cheok of Keio University’s Mixed Reality Lab has been a pioneer in blending the internet and the physical world, producing creations like Petimo, which allows kids to send hugs to each other over the internet; and Huggy Pajama, a similar solution for kids whose parent might be away. Projects from Mixed Reality Lab emphasize the importance of physical touch in a world where communication is drifting away from that particular sense.

Professor Cheok now has a new project in the works that iterates on this philosophy of blending physical touch with the internet. The RingU is another device that transmits these internet hugs, but it does so in a far more compact device. Using a ring connected to your smartphone by Bluetooth, signals can be sent to a paired ring over the internet. You can see a quick overview of RingU in the video below.

When you want to communicate a sort of virtual hug to your partner — and it could be a family member, a lover, or just a good friend — you squeese the ring, and your partner will receive this ‘tele-hug’ in real time. So even when separated by huge distances, you know that a person far away is thinking of you at that very moment. There are even different types of hugs which you can send — mini, intense, and urgent — depending on the situation.

You can also control the color of your partner’s ring according to whatever emotion you’re feeling at the time. There’s also the accompanying mobile app which partners can use as a private social network to share messages, photos, videos, thus complementing your physical hugs with the other types of communication you’ve become used to in this mobile age.

You can read more about the project over on the Mixed Reality Lab website, or view the project’s fund-raising page over on Campfire. So far the project has raised 110,000 yen (over $1,100) of its 300,000 yen goal.

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This is part of our “Crowdfunding in Japan” series (RSS). Services like KickStarter have become a global phenomenon with the power to let creative individuals take their ideas to new heights. It’s happening here in Japan too, and the story above is a prime example.

How Japan’s Keio University is reaching out to potential students abroad

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My old school, Keio University, is attracting some attention to its newly launched website, intended to attract students from abroad. Most notably, its two-minute video titled “Shaping History, Shaping Tomorrow,” shot by Australian filmmaker Tim White, exhibits all the charms of the university and Japan as a whole. This is Keio’s attempt to use social media to reach potential students outside the country. Since the video’s initial release last December, it has been played over 113,000 times on Youtube. The video’s creator Tim White noted: I wanted to express what is expected of Tokyo from students all over the world-heritage, cutting-edge technology, rich culture, friendly people, most safe and secure. The project was part of an initiative led by the Ministry of Education. Keio University was founded by Yukichi Fukuzawa in 1858, the same man pictured on the 10,000-yen bill. To check out more of the campus life at Keio University, here is another video, this one from the students of the Keio University Graduate School of Media Design.

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My old school, Keio University, is attracting some attention to its newly launched website, intended to attract students from abroad. Most notably, its two-minute video titled “Shaping History, Shaping Tomorrow,” shot by Australian filmmaker Tim White, exhibits all the charms of the university and Japan as a whole.

This is Keio’s attempt to use social media to reach potential students outside the country. Since the video’s initial release last December, it has been played over 113,000 times on Youtube. The video’s creator Tim White noted:

I wanted to express what is expected of Tokyo from students all over the world-heritage, cutting-edge technology, rich culture, friendly people, most safe and secure.

The project was part of an initiative led by the Ministry of Education. Keio University was founded by Yukichi Fukuzawa in 1858, the same man pictured on the 10,000-yen bill.

To check out more of the campus life at Keio University, here is another video, this one from the students of the Keio University Graduate School of Media Design.