Rick Martin
Here’s a fun app for any freelancers or homeworkers based in Japan. Dengen Cafe, released this past December, gives you a mapped view of cafes in your area that have a power outlet, so if you’re running low on juice, you can stop and plug in. It’s in Japanese (and is focused on Japan) but is pretty easy to navigate.
Check out Dengen Cafe on the App Store.
Our readers may recall we have featured Tokyo-based Sansan more than a few times in the past. Since the company’s launch back in 2007, it has been providing business card-based contact management solutions, in the form of its services Sansan [1] (for companies) and Eight (for individuals). Recently I received several notifications from the Eight app letting me know that a number of my contacts at the company had changed their profiles, because they had moved to a new office. The new space is located between Shibuya and Omotesando in Tokyo, a district that’s home to many prominent fashion brands. There is a cozy space available not only for their employees but also for the local community, with a great view of the city and lots of interesting potted trees and plants. One of the biggest reasons behind the company’s relocation is the rapid enlargement of their team. The number of their clients using the Sansan solution reached 1,500 companies as of this past December, up from 1,000 companies back in June. Eight, the freemium service for individuals, has acquired more than 600,000 users to date. The company may add premium features such as a mass e-mailing to your contacts…
Our readers may recall we have featured Tokyo-based Sansan more than a few times in the past. Since the company’s launch back in 2007, it has been providing business card-based contact management solutions, in the form of its services Sansan [1] (for companies) and Eight (for individuals).
Recently I received several notifications from the Eight app letting me know that a number of my contacts at the company had changed their profiles, because they had moved to a new office. The new space is located between Shibuya and Omotesando in Tokyo, a district that’s home to many prominent fashion brands. There is a cozy space available not only for their employees but also for the local community, with a great view of the city and lots of interesting potted trees and plants.
One of the biggest reasons behind the company’s relocation is the rapid enlargement of their team. The number of their clients using the Sansan solution reached 1,500 companies as of this past December, up from 1,000 companies back in June. Eight, the freemium service for individuals, has acquired more than 600,000 users to date. The company may add premium features such as a mass e-mailing to your contacts or exporting profiles for use in other apps.
In order to make it easier for Eight users to scan business cards from new contacts, Sansan has announced new services today in partnership with some business solution providers. The company has tied up with 10 co-working spaces in Tokyo, where entrepreneurs and SME owners can easily save the profiles of their contacts onto Eight using scanners at those sites. They will also provide a similar service at certain printing outlets.
Sansan has been intensifying its promotional efforts in the North American market as well, and it will be interesting to see how their solutions are accepted in regions beyond Japan.
Tokyo-based startup Translimit announced today that it has raised 10 million yen (about $100,000) from Genuine Startups [1] and Skyland Ventures. The funds will go towards launching a mobile quiz app with social competition features. The app will be called BrainWars, with an iOS version coming in mid-April, and an Android version to follow in June. BrainWars pits players against one another, playing three sets of mental exercise games (15 seconds each) to see which player performs better. Since these games require no verbal response [2], and users around the world can play and compete against each other regardless of language. The match is arranged to let you to play in real time, but if you can’t find anyone available to compete with, you can compete with someone you know according to their past results. In this space, we’ve already seen US-based Plain Vanilla Games, the startup behind trivia app QuizUp, which secured series B funding of $22 million from Sequoia Capital late last year. Here in Japan Namco Bandai has been selling a brain exercise app called Zen Notore. There’s Colopl Quiz RPG which has seen some success as well (iOS/Android). Translimit was initially launched back in January by Hiroki…
Tokyo-based startup Translimit announced today that it has raised 10 million yen (about $100,000) from Genuine Startups [1] and Skyland Ventures. The funds will go towards launching a mobile quiz app with social competition features. The app will be called BrainWars, with an iOS version coming in mid-April, and an Android version to follow in June.
BrainWars pits players against one another, playing three sets of mental exercise games (15 seconds each) to see which player performs better. Since these games require no verbal response [2], and users around the world can play and compete against each other regardless of language. The match is arranged to let you to play in real time, but if you can’t find anyone available to compete with, you can compete with someone you know according to their past results.
In this space, we’ve already seen US-based Plain Vanilla Games, the startup behind trivia app QuizUp, which secured series B funding of $22 million from Sequoia Capital late last year. Here in Japan Namco Bandai has been selling a brain exercise app called Zen Notore. There’s Colopl Quiz RPG which has seen some success as well (iOS/Android).
Translimit was initially launched back in January by Hiroki Takaba and Takuma Kudo, both of whom previously worked at CyberAgent companies. They have been involved in several game projects together, including the virtual avatar service Ameba Pico (which shut down back in 2012) and mobile social game Girl Friend BETA. The Translimit team is participating in Movida Japan incubation program here in Tokyo.
Tokyo-based Suvaco, a home design marketplace startup, announced yesterday that it has raised $120 million yen (or about $1.18 million) from Fuji Startup Ventures and Mobile Internet Capital. [1] Since their launch back in July, Suvaco has been providing a market place focused on home designs, where you can easily find interior or exterior designers by browsing their portfolio photos. Through a partnership with 200 home construction companies, to date the marketplace has acquired more than 8,000 examples of home renovation. Fuji Startup Ventures’s sister company is media entity Fusosha. Coinciding with these funds, Suvaco has partnered with this publishing company to jointly launch a website that lists home renovation examples and connects potential customers with partnering construction companies. Suvaco will charge the construction companies on a monthly or sales performance basis. Fuji Startup Ventures is the investment arm of Japan’s leading private broadcaster Fuji TV. Mobile Internet Capital is an investment firm founded by former Intel Japan CEO Ikuo Nishioka. ↩
Tokyo-based Suvaco, a home design marketplace startup, announced yesterday that it has raised $120 million yen (or about $1.18 million) from Fuji Startup Ventures and Mobile Internet Capital. [1]
Since their launch back in July, Suvaco has been providing a market place focused on home designs, where you can easily find interior or exterior designers by browsing their portfolio photos. Through a partnership with 200 home construction companies, to date the marketplace has acquired more than 8,000 examples of home renovation.
Fuji Startup Ventures’s sister company is media entity Fusosha. Coinciding with these funds, Suvaco has partnered with this publishing company to jointly launch a website that lists home renovation examples and connects potential customers with partnering construction companies. Suvaco will charge the construction companies on a monthly or sales performance basis.
We had the pleasure of attending e27’s Echelon Tokyo Satellite event today, where Taiwan-based startup ICHEF won the judges prize at the events pitch competition. They explained that conventional point-of-sales solutions are slow and heavy, and they result in bottlenecks during peak restaurant hours. But in contrast, their app is much quicker and versatile, using one iPad or multiple synchronized iPads. Currently they have 100 restaurants using their solution in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and they are planning to expand to Japan as well. They will charge a monthly fee to restaurants for use, which is their main monetization model, but the data that they can collect about purchases and orders is something that they could potentially use as well, in an anonymized or aggregate form.
We had the pleasure of attending e27’s Echelon Tokyo Satellite event today, where Taiwan-based startup ICHEF won the judges prize at the events pitch competition.
They explained that conventional point-of-sales solutions are slow and heavy, and they result in bottlenecks during peak restaurant hours. But in contrast, their app is much quicker and versatile, using one iPad or multiple synchronized iPads.
Currently they have 100 restaurants using their solution in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and they are planning to expand to Japan as well.
They will charge a monthly fee to restaurants for use, which is their main monetization model, but the data that they can collect about purchases and orders is something that they could potentially use as well, in an anonymized or aggregate form.
See the original story in Japanese. Japanese telco KDDI announced today that it has invested in Gunosy, the creator of a popular news curation app of the same name. Details of the investment were not disclosed but it’s likely worth somewhere from $12 million to $14 million according to certain sources. Coinciding with this funding, the startup is set to begin broadcast of a TV commercial in Japan tomorrow. Gunosy previously raised 31.6 million yen (about $300,000) back in February of 2013, and an undisclosed amount back in July of 2013. We have also confirmed they secured a seed round funding from several investors including B Dash Ventures. Gunosy was launched back in October of 2011 by three graduate students (Yoshinori Fukushima, Yoshifumi Seki, and Koji Yoshida) at the University of Tokyo. They incorporated their company in November, and co-CEO Shinji Kimura came on to help manage the company last October. Their main revenue stream has been Gunosy Ads, which have performanced well since launching last November. That feature was instrumental in helping them raise so much funds this time around.
Japanese telco KDDI announced today that it has invested in Gunosy, the creator of a popular news curation app of the same name. Details of the investment were not disclosed but it’s likely worth somewhere from $12 million to $14 million according to certain sources. Coinciding with this funding, the startup is set to begin broadcast of a TV commercial in Japan tomorrow.
Gunosy previously raised 31.6 million yen (about $300,000) back in February of 2013, and an undisclosed amount back in July of 2013. We have also confirmed they secured a seed round funding from several investors including B Dash Ventures.
Gunosy was launched back in October of 2011 by three graduate students (Yoshinori Fukushima, Yoshifumi Seki, and Koji Yoshida) at the University of Tokyo. They incorporated their company in November, and co-CEO Shinji Kimura came on to help manage the company last October.
Their main revenue stream has been Gunosy Ads, which have performanced well since launching last November. That feature was instrumental in helping them raise so much funds this time around.
Masaru Ikeda
Takeshi Hirano
