HalalMinds is a mobile app that can scan bar codes to see if a food is halal compliant, or permissible for Muslims to eat. When we featured it in April, they only had an Android version but have subsequently released an iOS version. They recently released version 2.0, which allows halal scanning of the bar code of drugs, cosmetics, and food products. In addition, the new version allows for scanning of E numbers —codes for food additives used in European countries.
Meanwhile, the HalalMinds team won a pre-startup award at Global TIC 2014, Taiwan’s largest business plan competition event which took place in Taipei on August 17–22. HalalMinds is the first award-winning team from Japan at this event. Leveraging this exposure, the team aims to accelerate Asian expansion, including enhancing the app so users can find halal restaurants and halal foods in China, South Korea, and Taiwan.
The app was developed by Indonesian student Agung Pambudi, a member of Kyushu Lab who has lived in Taiwan, South Korea, Malaysia, and Finland. KyushuLab is a software development community based on the southernmost of the four main islands in the Japanese archipelago.
Tokyo-based MakeLeaps, the startup behind a cloud-based invoicing platform under the same name, announced today that it has raised $600,000 through AngelList. Participating investors in this round include Naval Ravikant (AngelList), Richard Chen (Hatena) and Dave McClure (500 Startups). Since its launch in October 2011 by Australian serial entrepreneur Jason Winder, MakeLeaps provides an invoicing platform that targets freelancers as well as small/medium-sized enterprises, having acquired over 15,000 users. According to the company, the service saw a 20% user revenue growth rate in three months from April to June. MakeLeaps plans to use the funding to enhance the service and integrate it with other enterprise resource planning or B2B payment services so that more big companies will be able to put the platform into their in-house invoicing operations. In addition, MakeLeaps said it will increase sales representatives in order to boost marketing of the service to enterprise users.
Tokyo-based MakeLeaps, the startup behind a cloud-based invoicing platform under the same name, announced today that it has raised $600,000 through AngelList. Participating investors in this round include Naval Ravikant (AngelList), Richard Chen (Hatena) and Dave McClure (500 Startups).
Since its launch in October 2011 by Australian serial entrepreneur Jason Winder, MakeLeaps provides an invoicing platform that targets freelancers as well as small/medium-sized enterprises, having acquired over 15,000 users. According to the company, the service saw a 20% user revenue growth rate in three months from April to June.
MakeLeaps plans to use the funding to enhance the service and integrate it with other enterprise resource planning or B2B payment services so that more big companies will be able to put the platform into their in-house invoicing operations. In addition, MakeLeaps said it will increase sales representatives in order to boost marketing of the service to enterprise users.
See the original story in Japanese. Japanese startup Eureka has an office in Ebisu, Tokyo. Since its launch in 2008, the company has provided mobile apps like Pairs and Couples. We recently visited the office to hear from the company’s CEO Yu Akasaka and COO Jun Nishikawa. Boasting over 1.3 million users In July, Akasaka and Nishikawa co-founded a company focused on incubating and investing in startups in Japan and the rest of the world, called Eureka Ventures. In association with DeNA and other companies, Eureka Ventures participated in a $500,000 investment round in East Meet East, a New York-based online dating service for Asian people. Eureka expects that the partnership through this investment help their business grow further while exploring a business synergy between the North American and Asian markets. Since its launch two years ago, the Pairs app has acquired over 1.3 million downloads from the Japanese and Taiwanese markets to date, with about 500,000 users users coming from Taiwan. Given the high penetration rate of Facebook and a pro-Japanese attitude, they attempted to focus on marketing in Taiwan, becoming a big success. Akasaka explained what prompted them to start developing the Pairs app: There are many online…
Eureka CEO Yu Akasaka (right) and Jun Nishikawa (left)
Japanese startup Eureka has an office in Ebisu, Tokyo. Since its launch in 2008, the company has provided mobile apps like Pairs and Couples. We recently visited the office to hear from the company’s CEO Yu Akasaka and COO Jun Nishikawa.
Boasting over 1.3 million users
In July, Akasaka and Nishikawa co-founded a company focused on incubating and investing in startups in Japan and the rest of the world, called Eureka Ventures. In association with DeNA and other companies, Eureka Ventures participated in a $500,000 investment round in East Meet East, a New York-based online dating service for Asian people. Eureka expects that the partnership through this investment help their business grow further while exploring a business synergy between the North American and Asian markets.
Since its launch two years ago, the Pairs app has acquired over 1.3 million downloads from the Japanese and Taiwanese markets to date, with about 500,000 users users coming from Taiwan. Given the high penetration rate of Facebook and a pro-Japanese attitude, they attempted to focus on marketing in Taiwan, becoming a big success.
Akasaka explained what prompted them to start developing the Pairs app:
There are many online dating services in the North American and North European markets. But we thought this sector is not yet well established and still had much space for growth. Typical online dating sites may give you a negative impression, so we understood the importance of changing the culture to improve it.
After shutting down two mobile apps
Eureka has actually introduced four apps to date: Online dating and marriage hunting app Pairs, memory sharing app Couples, app discovery app Peepapp and its antecedent Pickie. But the latter two services have already been shut down.
Following other users, Peepapps allowed you to peep what apps they were using. But it was too early because there was no trend among people exploring a new app on a social basis. Regardless of support from a big company or a big promotion budget, we learned through our experience that a service not in step with the times would be never accepted.
After shutting down the two services, Eureka had been exploring the next business to take on while handling cultivation of contracted software development businesses. Nishikawa subsequently came up with an idea for an online dating service:
When it comes to a new business idea, we wanted to create one which is obviously monetizable. The online dating sector is becoming integrated and has a solid revenue model. I believed a huge potential is out there because I saw many friends around me using such service when I was abroad to study.
Adopting a data-driven approach
Despite the fact that the Asian region is considered a ‘Blue Ocean’ market for them, there are many competitors in the online dating sector. What is a key advantage behind their steady growth?
The two co-founders have strong backgrounds in marketing through their experience working with e-commerce businesses. They attach much importance to metrics like customer acquisition cost, lifetime value or conversion rate, and are adjusting the service in line with the data-driven approach that they have learned from their previous business experiences. Akasaka elaborated:
We keep seeing metrics and improving the app every day. In addition to various metrics and user feedback, we’re sharing figures like how many times the app has crashed in our entire team so we can run a PDCA cycle very quickly.
Improving user experience to satisfy user needs
Akasaka pointed out that both the product itself and the promotion effort combined make a big success. These are directly linked with behavior which they have been developing the app toward, from the user’s perspective.
Akasaka explained how they are making efforts to improve the app:
We launched a new version of the Pairs app for iOS and Android on August 21, where we rolled out various improvements. For example, typical online dating apps show you square-shaped profile photos but we changed it to round-shaped ones, which shows less numbers of candidates in a first view screen. This is a very minor change but creates a world view different from that of conventional dating sites, which makes users easier to sign up.
Nishikawa added:
While our desktop version looks like Facebook, the iOS app has adopted a similar interface to Line. Considering apps that our users are using most often, we are improving interfaces of the service for devices accordingly.
We can see their thoughtfulness in the well-designed interface. For example, they use an elaborate design in the app screen so you will not have to worry about a peep even when you are using the app in a crowded train. That’s from considering Japanese women’s typical concern that they hate anyone knowing about them using an online dating app.
Educational activities needed in any markets
The Pairs has acquired over 8 million Facebook likes, over 1 million monthly active users, and matched over 4 million couples in total.
However, once a user finds a good partner on the Pairs app, he or she will quit the app shortly. How did the team address this issue? In a response to my question, Akasaka explained:
It doesn’t matter. If a couple step into the next phase, they will start another of our apps, Couples. Even if their relationship doesn’t work out, they will get back to us and start using the Pairs app again.
As Akasaka now thinks that they can grow the service tenfold, he aims to educate people and improve their negative stereotype about encounters through online dating services. Nishikawa explained how they will proceed from here:
We invested in New York-based online dating service East Meet East a month ago. In a recent discussion with the team, they told us even Western couples are not willing to unveil that they have met each others using an online dating service. So this education process will be needed globally. We’ll be devoting ourselves to it.
Tokyo-based Zuu, the startup that operates financial advisor matching platform Zuu Advisors, announced today that it has fundraised 105 million yen (about $1 million) from four angel investors including Japan’s mobile i-mode web service inventor Takeshi Natsuno and listed-company owners. The company provides a dozen web services including Zoo Advisors Support, a website of marketing tips for brokers and salespersons of wealth management products. Other websites include Japanese property market trend news site Tokyo Premium Real Estate and wealth management-focused portal Zuu Online (US Edition), both are available in English. The company will use the funds to strengthen their engineering and marketing teams to roll out improvements of their web services. Zuu was founded in 2013 by Kazumasa Tomita, who previously worked in the wealth management department of Nomura Securities.
Tokyo-based Zuu, the startup that operates financial advisor matching platform Zuu Advisors, announced today that it has fundraised 105 million yen (about $1 million) from four angel investors including Japan’s mobile i-mode web service inventor Takeshi Natsuno and listed-company owners.
The company provides a dozen web services including Zoo Advisors Support, a website of marketing tips for brokers and salespersons of wealth management products. Other websites include Japanese property market trend news site Tokyo Premium Real Estate and wealth management-focused portal Zuu Online (US Edition), both are available in English.
The company will use the funds to strengthen their engineering and marketing teams to roll out improvements of their web services.
Zuu was founded in 2013 by Kazumasa Tomita, who previously worked in the wealth management department of Nomura Securities.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based startup Vivit launched an excursion buddy and destination discovery site under the same name last week. The startup participated in the sixth edition of Incubate Camp, an intensive two-day business development program for entrepreneurs organized by Japan’s Incubate Fund. Coinciding with service startup, Vivit announced that it had fundraised about 30 million yen (about $300,000) this spring from Venture United and Incubate Fund . Vivit lists outdoor activities, from rafting and buggy rides to sightseeing hotspots and seasonal events. By integrating with a Facebook account, users can express interest in an activity on the website and share it with friends by clicking on the “I-want-to-go” button. The service highlights activities your friends like, so your friends may also see activities you want to join in. If you or a friend shares the same activity as their preference, a “talk button” will appear onscreen to show the activity, which allows you to interact with him or her and even arrange an itinerary to enable participation together. The website has listed about 150 activities to date, and most of them are day-trip excursions in the Tokyo metropolitan area and its suburbs. They released the service…
Tokyo-based startup Vivit launched an excursion buddy and destination discovery site under the same name last week. The startup participated in the sixth edition of Incubate Camp, an intensive two-day business development program for entrepreneurs organized by Japan’s Incubate Fund. Coinciding with service startup, Vivit announced that it had fundraised about 30 million yen (about $300,000) this spring from Venture United and Incubate Fund .
Vivit lists outdoor activities, from rafting and buggy rides to sightseeing hotspots and seasonal events. By integrating with a Facebook account, users can express interest in an activity on the website and share it with friends by clicking on the “I-want-to-go” button.
The service highlights activities your friends like, so your friends may also see activities you want to join in. If you or a friend shares the same activity as their preference, a “talk button” will appear onscreen to show the activity, which allows you to interact with him or her and even arrange an itinerary to enable participation together.
The website has listed about 150 activities to date, and most of them are day-trip excursions in the Tokyo metropolitan area and its suburbs. They released the service partially to go live prior to their official release at this time, and told that they have acquired more than 10,000 visits from users.
The website lists about 150 activities, and most are day-trip excursions in Tokyo and its suburbs. The service gained more than 10,000 user visits recently, upon “teaser” release prior to official release.
CEO Hisayoshi Mizutani highlighted the service:
For a short-term excursion, you should emphasize with whom one wants to go with rather than where to go. By visualizing and sharing excursion preferences for you and your friends, our service allows you to create more opportunities to hang out, fulfill leisure time, and help connect with more people
One may experience an interesting hotspot or leisure destination but give up because it’s troublesome to find someone to visit together and to arrange plans. However, Vivit enables completion of a set of processes from discovering an activity to arranging an itinerary with someone.
Mizutani outlined his development strategy:
TThe more users we acquire, we will gain more activities they like. Based on this data, we’re developing an algorithm that can recommend someone with similar preferences as you. We are also planning to launch a mobile app and a media site. We aim to acquire 100,000 users by the end of this year, hopefully publishing around 200 to 300 new activities each month.
Vivit’s CEO Hisayoshi Mizutani is pitching at Incubate Camp 6th. (His mentor Satoshi Maruyama from Venture United on the left)
See the original story in Japanese. Japanese UX design firm Goodpatch fundraised 100 million yen (or about $1 million) from DG Incubation, the investment arm of Digital Garage (TSE:4819) in December 2013. Back then the firm was in Akihabara, but two months ago they moved to Shibuya, a major startup hub in Tokyo. Upon visiting the new Goodpatch office, this reporter met a familiar person in addition to the CEO, Naofumi Tsuchiya. It was Boris Friedrich Milkowski, a German who had studied at Keio Media Design (KMD). When he was attending the university, I had been requested by him to join a group focus interview where I offered him my insights about the UI/UX trends for Japanese apps as well as about local startups in Tokyo. He subsequently joined the Goodpatch team for business development to help accelerate the company’s global market expansion. Goodpatch launched rapid prototyping tool Prott as a “closed beta” in March, and their team is finalizing the release of its official version and its iOS app, scheduled to go live soon. CEO Naofumi Tsuchiya aims to disrupt the industry with the Prott app: Prototyping is not so common in Japan, but overseas, many developers typically prototype…
Japanese UX design firm Goodpatch fundraised 100 million yen (or about $1 million) from DG Incubation, the investment arm of Digital Garage (TSE:4819) in December 2013. Back then the firm was in Akihabara, but two months ago they moved to Shibuya, a major startup hub in Tokyo.
Upon visiting the new Goodpatch office, this reporter met a familiar person in addition to the CEO, Naofumi Tsuchiya. It was Boris Friedrich Milkowski, a German who had studied at Keio Media Design (KMD). When he was attending the university, I had been requested by him to join a group focus interview where I offered him my insights about the UI/UX trends for Japanese apps as well as about local startups in Tokyo. He subsequently joined the Goodpatch team for business development to help accelerate the company’s global market expansion.
Goodpatch launched rapid prototyping tool Prott as a “closed beta” in March, and their team is finalizing the release of its official version and its iOS app, scheduled to go live soon. CEO Naofumi Tsuchiya aims to disrupt the industry with the Prott app:
Prototyping is not so common in Japan, but overseas, many developers typically prototype prior to app development commencement. We want to educate the Japanese app development industry about the need for prototyping in association with other companies in this sector.
A prototyping tool allows planners or designers to create a mock-up instantly even if they are less familiar with coding.
Existing design tools have many functions but less usability for mobile app designs. By adding various functions such as “drawing function” to Prott, we can bite into user bases held by other software, such as Adobe Photoshop.
The drawing function he mentioned will be supported in the future version of the Prott app. In addition, they are considering supporting other features like those enabling export of a prototype that has been created outside the prototyping tool.
Because the Protto app has been developed in Japan, it obviously supports the Japanese language. But 70% of users are overseas. We are keen to see how their global release and expansion efforts go.
Goodpatch aims to create a comfortable working environment similar to that of startups in Silicon Valley. The company spent a lot on relocation and interior design, but Tsuchiya says the investment will be worthwhile if it can attract talented people.
An unconfirmed report has it that the Tokyo event of Finland’s annual startup conference Slush will take place at the Goodpatch office on October 3rd. The 2013 event took place at Open Network Lab. By helping organize such events, Goodpatch can contribute to the local startup community in Tokyo and bring in a lot of international perspectives and entrepreneurial spirit.
Goodpatch consists of a 32-person team, of which seven are developing the Prott app. Another prototyping tool Pop, which came from Silicon Valley and Taiwan, recently announced their full-fledged entry into the Japanese market, which indicates this space is heating up. To expand Prott and other UI/UX-focused projects, Goodpatch is hiring, so those interested in working there are advised to immediately contact the firm.
At the entrance.Many flowers from startup folks celebrating Goodpatch’s new office.Rilakkuma is always seated on the best position.A standing desk is good for people like me who have a sore back.A comfortable meeting room overflowing an opening feeling.We see pingpong tables at many startup offices these days.If you visit this corner, you may feel like as if you’ve visited a stylish bar.
Masaru Ikeda
Yukari Mitsuhashi
Junya Mori
