Japanese robotics startup Meltin MMI announced today it has raised 2.02 billion yen (about $18 million US) from Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma (TSE:4506), SBI Investment and Daiichi Life Insurance (TSE:8750) in a series B round. For Meltin this follows their seed round funding (the amount raised not disclosed) from Euglena SMBC Nikko Leave-a-Nest Capital and Globalink back in January of 2016 and their series A round funding (raised about $2.1 million US) from Realtech Fund, Mirai Creation Fund (by Toyota and SMBC) and the Japanese Organization for Medical Device Development (JOMDD).
Meltin was born out from the incubator belonging to the University of Electro-Communications in Tokyo to develop cyborg technologies using bio-signals and robotics. Since its launch back in July of 2013, the company has been primarily focused on R&D and commercialization of medical and welfare equipment, avatar robots and other devices ー extending people’s physical ability. Integrating bio-signal processing technologies that accurately analyze the human’s body movements and intention with robot mechanisms that faithfully reproduce those movements in the real world, the company aims to realize the practical level of Brain Machine Interface (BMI) and cyborg.
Meltin uses the funds raised to accelerate development of the practical model of Meltant, the company’s flagship and remotely operable avatar robot, as well as medical devices.
The company won the Startup Division award at Realtech Venture of the Year by Leave a Nest back in March of 2016, followed by winning the audience’s choice of exhibitor at Microsoft Innovation Award back in May of 2016.
Translated by Masaru Ikeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Ginco, the Japanese startup developing a multi-cryptocurrency wallet app, officially announced the launch of its decentralized exchange (DEX) on the app. The availability of the DEX function will be limited to users outside Japan for the time being because it may require them to register as a “virtual
Tokyo-based Ginco, the Japanese startup developing a multi-cryptocurrency wallet app, officially announced the launch of its decentralized exchange (DEX) on the app. The availability of the DEX function will be limited to users outside Japan for the time being because it may require them to register as a “virtual currency exchanger” with the Financial Services Agency (FSA), the Japanese monetary authority.
Muuto Morikawa, CEO of Ginco, unveiled the DEX function to be already live for overseas users during the Pitch Arena competition at B Dash Camp 2018 Fall, the startup conference held in Fukuoka last month. In order to allow users to buy / sell different cryptocurrencies in the app with each other, integration with KyberSwap, an application program interface by Singapore-based DEX project Kyber Network. was realized.
Starting with a cryptowallet app, Ginco aims to build a comprehensive asset platform that can deal with all types of cryptocurrencies. Their other services include a crypto-mining business in Mongolia (launched in June) and development of a hardware wallet (planned for launch next year). The exact launch schedule for the exchange function in Japan is yet unclear because it is totally up to talks with FSA.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Sonas, the Japanese startup developing a wireless communication technology for IoT (Internet of Things) called UNISONet, announced on Tuesday that it has fundraised a total of 350 million (about $3.1M US) from Global Brain and Anri in the series A round. This is a follow-on investment for Anri after also participating in the seed round (in 2017, precise time and amount undisclosed). Sonas will increase the number of employees with the amount raised at this time round. Sonas was established in 2015 and began doing business in wireless communication technology in 2017. Many of its members hail from the University of Tokyo’s Morikawa Laboratory (named after Professor Hiroyuki Morikawa), which specializes in advanced studies of mobile and sensor networks. Multi-hop wireless network configuration (topology) can be roughly divided into two categories: star type and mesh type. Sigfox, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy), etc., are all examples of star type conguration where each node and hub communicate, but the speed and range of communication are in a trade-off relationship. On the other hand, with mesh type configuration the routing of the data depends on the communication environment, so it is difficult to synchronize…
From left: Jiro Kumakura (General Partner, Global Brain), Kenta Kitsuka (Principal, Global Brain), Yasuhiko Yurimoto (CEO, Global Brain), Sotaro Ohara (CEO, Sonas), Makoto Suzuki (CTO, Sonas) Image credit: Global Brain / Sonas
Tokyo-based Sonas, the Japanese startup developing a wireless communication technology for IoT (Internet of Things) called UNISONet, announced on Tuesday that it has fundraised a total of 350 million (about $3.1M US) from Global Brain and Anri in the series A round. This is a follow-on investment for Anri after also participating in the seed round (in 2017, precise time and amount undisclosed). Sonas will increase the number of employees with the amount raised at this time round.
Sonas was established in 2015 and began doing business in wireless communication technology in 2017. Many of its members hail from the University of Tokyo’s Morikawa Laboratory (named after Professor Hiroyuki Morikawa), which specializes in advanced studies of mobile and sensor networks.
Multi-hop wireless network configuration (topology) can be roughly divided into two categories: star type and mesh type. Sigfox, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy), etc., are all examples of star type conguration where each node and hub communicate, but the speed and range of communication are in a trade-off relationship. On the other hand, with mesh type configuration the routing of the data depends on the communication environment, so it is difficult to synchronize timing among nodes and create a power saving design.
UNISONet, developed by Sonas, is a technology capable of taking the “cherry pick” of star and mesh type configuration. It has realized a high-performance, power saving multi-hop network by combining simultaneous flooding and intricate scheduling.
Sonas x01 (left) and Sonas xs01 (right). Photos not to scale. Image credit: Sonas
In an environment where existing communication technology and power supply are difficult to secure, and because values can be obtained at the same time among numerous communication nodes, it is often used for inspections and safety checks on buildings and structures with accelerometers.
Additionally, the company will partner with K-Opticom, the telco subsidiary of Kansai Electric Power Company in Osaka. It will be used for monitoring in environments where it is difficult to secure a power supply and communication paths, such as power plant equipment and safety checks for motor bearings. By doing this, it is easier to discover abnormalities in advance, prevent future problems, and replace regular check-ups.
Sonas’ UNISONet technology begins with its own wireless communication modules, but in order to make it easier for corporate users the company has developed the sensor devices Sonas x01 and Sonas xs01 which combine a high-precision accelerator sensor, a power-saving sensor, a processor, and storage along with a cloud capable of integrating and analyzing Windows software and data. Until now this package has been available to companies working together with Sonas, but with the funds procured this time around the company plans to launch full-fledged sales. In addition to expanding sales in Japan, the company is also considering expansion in the US and China.
See the original story in Japanese. The VR (Virtual Reality) startup incubator Tokyo XR Startups, managed by Japan’s game developer Gumi (TSE:3903) and others, this month held Demo Day for its incubation program 4th batch. A total of seven teams gave pitches at the event: five teams from the 4th batch, one team from Nordic XR Startups (jointly managed by Gumi and Nordic Film) and one team supported by Tokyo-based Future Tech Hub. Tokyo XR Startups, Seoul XR Startups and Nordic XR Startups have incubated 43 teams in total. For Tokyo XR Startups alone, the total raised amount by 16 teams which received its supports until the previous 3rd batch reached 2 billion yen (about $18 million) and their total valuation amount exceeds 12 billion yen (about $105 billion). Five in seven teams of from Seoul XR Startups 1st and 2nd batch had succeeded in fundraising, and Atticfab turned out from the 1st batch won the top prize at the Korean tradeshow event IMPACT-ECH (hosted by The Korea Economic Daily and Korea Association of Information & Telecommunication) in 2018. At Oculus Connect 5 held last week at San Jose, California the launch of the all-in-one VR headset named Oculus Quest…
Graduating teams and mentors from Tokyo XR Startups’ 4th incubation batch Image credit: Masaru Ikeda
The VR (Virtual Reality) startup incubator Tokyo XR Startups, managed by Japan’s game developer Gumi (TSE:3903) and others, this month held Demo Day for its incubation program 4th batch. A total of seven teams gave pitches at the event: five teams from the 4th batch, one team from Nordic XR Startups (jointly managed by Gumi and Nordic Film) and one team supported by Tokyo-based Future Tech Hub.
Tokyo XR Startups, Seoul XR Startups and Nordic XR Startups have incubated 43 teams in total. For Tokyo XR Startups alone, the total raised amount by 16 teams which received its supports until the previous 3rd batch reached 2 billion yen (about $18 million) and their total valuation amount exceeds 12 billion yen (about $105 billion). Five in seven teams of from Seoul XR Startups 1st and 2nd batch had succeeded in fundraising, and Atticfab turned out from the 1st batch won the top prize at the Korean tradeshow event IMPACT-ECH (hosted by The Korea Economic Daily and Korea Association of Information & Telecommunication) in 2018.
Toshinao Kunimitsu, Founder of Tokyo XR Startups / Founder and CEO of Gumi Image credit: Masaru Ikeda
At Oculus Connect 5 held last week at San Jose, California the launch of the all-in-one VR headset named Oculus Quest was announced and will go on sale for $399. At the beginning of Tokyo VR Startups Demo Day, Hironao Kunimitsu (CEO of Gumi) commented,
I was shocked to hear that Oculus Quest is priced at less than $400 while everybody is concerned about whether every VR headset costs $500 or less. It will significantly lower the hurdle to the spread of VR in a rush.
The possibility that VR headsets will be popularized from the launch of Oculus Quest in the next spring has been raised without waiting for falling prices.
This article introduces the startups turned out from Tokyo XR Startups 4th batch. Two of the five teams is in stealth mode and is not covered below.
Otohane Rara by Unisonlive
Unisonlive proposed a VTuber (Virtual YouTuber) business focusing on live performance by high-end 3D music VTuber. Since music and animation character have high affinity, customer collection is much easier through music distribution, live event or character goods by creating VTuber with high singing ability. On the other hand, the entry barrier is high for potential competitors because it requires highly skilled staffers specialized in music production, recording, mastering and motion capturing.
Unisonlive had produced 40 songs monthly during the 4th batch period, in addition to establishing a video creation system to create a 3DCG optimized for one song in an hour. The team includes music producer, novel writer and character designer, and is currently developing an animation character named Otohane Rara. Its first Twitter video was played 13,000 times and has been played 4,300 times in a day. In the future, the team plans to form a VTuber band, and the concept design of characters has already been completed.
Owl by Edoga
Edoga proposed an employee training service using VR. As the working population is decreasing in Japan, a significant productivity improvement is necessary but labor-intensive industries are busily working on competition for human resources and can save neither time nor opportunity for human resource development due to various reasons such as ‘not having much time’ or ‘too costly.’
Edoga develops the VR-based virtual employee training center and provides an environment where users can practice in a simulated work environment efficiently at a low cost wherever they are. The team aims at the NetFlix position in the employee training business. As Walmart introduced STRVR and Volkswagen introduced Innoactive, several successive cases can be seen overseas. Edoga recently contracted a financial / business cooperation with the independent IT employee training major Trainocateg, looking ahead to its business expansion.
ToPolog by Geocreates
Geocreates develops SaaS (Software as a Service) for architectural designing VR named ToPolog. When building up a structure, an architectural office plans and offers an architectural design based on its experience, and a customer judges whether the presented plan is adopted or not based on his experience. As a result, there is a distant resemblance among buildings in town. ToPolog’s approach is to lead architectural designing to a quantitative data-based method, without depending on experience and intuition.
Customer users put on head-mount display and can experience architectural designs as VR with realistic feeling. Analyzing eye direction tracking data and brain wave, this service provides information in which part of the design the customers are satisfied or not and leads to optimized design plan by carrying out PDCA. It targets interior industry, real estate companies, construction companies or retail industry. The team has been raising funds targeting the end of November with its goal of 150 million yen (about $1.3 million).
Simultaneously, with this Demo Day for the 4th batch, Tokyo XR Startups begins accepting applications from startups for the 5th batch participation. The application deadline is November 30th and there are two points of change in its incubation program.
The one is that blockchain startups are allowed to apply in addition to XR (VR, AR, MR) field and no concern with XR is needed for them. The other is that the incubation program is separated into pre-program (for teams that passed pre-selection) and main program (for teams that passed final selection). In the pre-program, participation teams are given grace time to build up team or to create development plan for two months at the longest. In the main program, qualified teams are given 5 to 15 million yen ($44,000 to $132) and carry out product development or service prototyping over four months at the longest.
As mentioned at the beginning of this article, as the hardware elements for the spread of VR have been gradually prepared, Tokyo XR Startups also focuses on killer contents and cooperates with the virtual talent support platform Upd8 (pronounced “update”) to create virtual talents. The application conditions are: having virtual talent plans and being able to launch virtual talents within three months. The participants teams can receive production / activity funds, use right of studio for free, advises on devices and techniques from Upd8. In addition, back office supports including legal and personnel issues are available from Tokyo XR Startups.
Seven teams, five teams and three teams will be chosen for the pre-program, the main program and the virtual talent support program at most, respectively.
Translated by Taijiro Takeda Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Pathee, the Japanese service behind a locality directory service under the same name, announced that it raised 650 million yen (around $5.8M US) on Tuesday. The exact round is not known, but it can be regarded as the post-series A round. Mitsui & Co., Eight Roads Ventures Japan, Regional Revitalization Solution, Dai-ichi Kangyo Credit Cooperative, Seqvel, and SMBC Venture Capital all participated this round. For Pathee, it follows the series A round (300 million yen raised) held in June of 2017 (the company name at this time was Trietrue). The total amount released publicly of funds raised thus far is 1.1 billion yen (about $9.7M US). Pathee got its start as a search engine for locality information. Some of our readers may recall that we introduced the company as a finalist in the Innovation Weekend Grand Finale 2013 nearly five years ago. When a user wants to purchase a product or avail of a service from nearby, it is difficult unless they already have a shop name in mind or a clearly defined basic product, even using the popular engines. It is common for restaurants and bars to have some sort of website,…
L to R: Eight Roads Ventures Japan’s Junichi Murata, Pathee CEO Shinsuke Terada, Mitsui & Co.’s Tadaharu Okubo Image credit: Pathee
Tokyo-based Pathee, the Japanese service behind a locality directory service under the same name, announced that it raised 650 million yen (around $5.8M US) on Tuesday. The exact round is not known, but it can be regarded as the post-series A round. Mitsui & Co., Eight Roads Ventures Japan, Regional Revitalization Solution, Dai-ichi Kangyo Credit Cooperative, Seqvel, and SMBC Venture Capital all participated this round. For Pathee, it follows the series A round (300 million yen raised) held in June of 2017 (the company name at this time was Trietrue). The total amount released publicly of funds raised thus far is 1.1 billion yen (about $9.7M US).
Pathee got its start as a search engine for locality information. Some of our readers may recall that we introduced the company as a finalist in the Innovation Weekend Grand Finale 2013 nearly five years ago. When a user wants to purchase a product or avail of a service from nearby, it is difficult unless they already have a shop name in mind or a clearly defined basic product, even using the popular engines. It is common for restaurants and bars to have some sort of website, but the same does not hold true for other small businesses, and even with search engine crawling the information is unattainable.
Setting their sights on this, the company released Pathee Partner in April of this year. The service specializes in small stores apart from eating and drinking establishments and, as an alternative to a store website, it makes creating primary information easy. It is designed to not only catch searches on Pathee, but also through the crawling of other search engines. The introduction pages of retail businesses using Pathee Partner appear in the top five after searching for related products and store names, which in turn leads the customer to the retailer’s store.
Pathee CEO Shinsuke Terada explained:
Instead of going to a store and then searching for a product, more and more people are going to the shop after searching for the merchandise. We made it so people don’t have to use the keyword ‘sports shop’ to search for one, but instead search for the products they want or their objective for going. Search results should only consist of products made by Pathee Partner, and we are thinking about making an app once recognition increases to a certain degree.
While startups supporting diners and restaurants are fiercely competing each other, the vertical of those helping other retail businesses market are still seeking a clear monetization where many opportunities remain untouched according to Terada.
In view of how to make money from helping dining businesses, it would be possible to do so by driving customers to them (from online to offline). However, nor would it for other retail businesses because it would be harder to determine how much online efforts could contribute to their sales result.
That’s why we decided to serve in the form of SaaS (software as a service) so that we can easily make retailers pay for our service. While Amazon sweeps the world of online commerce, when physical stores use Pathee Partner we have created a direct line to connect them to the customers they are looking for.”
Since Pathee’s search results had no function to display retail store details, Pathee Partner came as a byproduct positioned to fill the gap. Since its release six months ago, the pull of the service has been very good. The company counts many chain stores as customers, and all one needs to do to collect all the pages of all stores at once is talk with the headquarters in Tokyo. That’s business efficiency.
Pathee Partner has functions that allow physical stores to manage all their digital marketing measures at once, such as simple content creation, managing social networking accounts and posts, traffic analysis, and so on. Pathee aims to use the funds raised this time around to improve the sales organization of Pathee Partner, and plans to further expand Pathee Partner’s company users, which now total 60.
Reading up to this point, some readers may be under the impression that Pathee has completely pivoted to a digital marketing startup for retailers, but this is actually not the case. The company, which can already give a return on a user’s original search, will continue to sharpen its technology that reconstructs locality information semantically (For example, with respect to the keyword “Shinjuku”, Pathee’s engine can determine whether the user means “Shinjuku station” or “Shinjuku neighborhood”). Terada related that he wants to focus on improving the accuracy of the search engine technology while strengthening the financial bases of its administration by expanding sales of Pathee Partner.
Translated by Amanda Imasaka Edited by Masaru Ikeda
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Favy, the Japanese startup behind a comprehensive food marketing service including gourmet media, has just announced that it raised 1 billion yen (about $8.8 million) from Mynavi, a Japanese leading human resource informaiton portal provider. The two companies formed a capital tie-up and began cooperation in marketing service provision / recruitment business for nationwide restaurant chains. Specifically, Mynavi will introduce restaurant clients who are interested in recruitment to Favy, utilizing Mynavi’s promotion network consisting of 1,000 staffers and 60 bases all over Japan. They are to jointly develop recruitment branding products that target restaurant users as well. At the same timing, Favy announced the launch of Favy Store, a service store for retailers. Boasting 67 million MAU closing in on big players It is newsworthy that Favy succeeded in this large-scale fundraising using an interesting business model, upon which we have been focused since this company started up. As borne out by the investor list consisting of a single company — Mynavi — Favy’s main purpose this time was business tie-up rather than money. According to Takumi Takanashi, CEO of Favy, the number of its staffer has been increased to 210 in which…
L to R: Kazuma Mori (Manager of Domestic Business Development Dpt. of Mynavi), Takumi Takanashi (CEO of Favy)
Tokyo-based Favy, the Japanese startup behind a comprehensive food marketing service including gourmet media, has just announced that it raised 1 billion yen (about $8.8 million) from Mynavi, a Japanese leading human resource informaiton portal provider.
The two companies formed a capital tie-up and began cooperation in marketing service provision / recruitment business for nationwide restaurant chains. Specifically, Mynavi will introduce restaurant clients who are interested in recruitment to Favy, utilizing Mynavi’s promotion network consisting of 1,000 staffers and 60 bases all over Japan.
They are to jointly develop recruitment branding products that target restaurant users as well. At the same timing, Favy announced the launch of Favy Store, a service store for retailers.
Boasting 67 million MAU closing in on big players
It is newsworthy that Favy succeeded in this large-scale fundraising using an interesting business model, upon which we have been focused since this company started up. As borne out by the investor list consisting of a single company — Mynavi — Favy’s main purpose this time was business tie-up rather than money. According to Takumi Takanashi, CEO of Favy, the number of its staffer has been increased to 210 in which restaurant staffers account for half while its marketing system strengthened to 50 staffers.
Mynavi has not handled food-related contents previously so apparently was in need of a touch-point for its operational portfolio. Mynavi has restaurant accounts based on recruitment of part-time staffers and it is easy to understand that the firm aims to upsell by leveraging such business.
One aspect to scrutinize regarding this news is the increase in Favy’s business reach. Although a simple comparison is impossible with only 67 million MAU (monthly active users) announced this time, as for the status of the two key gourmet media players in Japan, Tabelog has 154.19 million monthly users with the total number of online reservations reaching 40 million (as of June 2018) while Gnavi has 65 million monthly unique users and a membership is 16.05 million (as of July 2018). Figures for both are quoted from their financial result documents for the third quarter of 2019.
Favy plans and operates showcase retailers
Favy’s Takanashi (left) with Seven Dreamers CEO Shin Sakane (right)
It is difficult to explain Favy’s business model. I had tried to analyze it in the previous round last year, but it does not remain in the same place as in the past. Its core service is Favy Page, the marketing package for restaurants. It is a SaaS (software as a service) model which provides various marketing functions such as introduction article published on Favy, listing advertisement agency, guarantee for no-notice reservation cancellations and customer management, charging 15,000 to 50,000 yen (about $130 to $440) monthly according to service plans. The firm has disclosed that 30,000 restaurant users are using this service, including those who using free plans.
In addition, the firm conducts a showcase-like business with real retailers as introduced before. The aim of this service is to develop business model for restaurants. The firm announced this September that it is going to establish a “co-working space for chefs” wherein their knowledge bases can be integrated.
Co-working space focusing on food business in Ginza, scheduled to open soon.
Favi Store, the new service announced this time, is also a part of the comprehensive marketing service providing chefs or companies who want to start restaurant business with know-how of restaurant management in the digital marketing era, such as automation of restaurant management, promotion, recruitment, business style planning, hardware purchase or choice of property. Takanashi called it PaaS (platform as a service) for restaurants. Anyway, the firm has acquired Big Data about what 67 million monthly users want to eat, as an entrance into the following services.
If its data tracking is combined with retailers’ visitor data including location or beacon information in the future, this service can likely become an absolute platform connecting readers and restaurants effectively. In fact, I heard ideas beyond that and will introduce it next time. In the Japanese gourmet media field, major players like Tabelog, Gnavi and Hot Pepper have long held dominance but it seems certain that Favy will gradually assert its presence.
Translated by Taijiro Takeda Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy
The Bridge
Masaru Ikeda
Takeshi Hirano
