Tokyo-headquartered Ignition Point, offering digital transformation support for enterprises as well as startup studio functions, has been acquired by Dentsu Group (TSE: 4324). The firm will become a consolidated subsidiary of the ad giant. Financial terms for the acquisition has not yet been disclosed.
Upon the acquisition, Ignition Point will soon begin collaborating with Dentsu Japan Network, the Japanese business operating company of the ad conglomerate, strengthening its business in the areas of business transformation (BX) and digital transformation (DX).
Ignition Point was established in 2014 by Kazuhiro Aoyagi, a former Deloitte Tohmatsu Consulting employee. After the acquisition, Aoyagi stepped down as president while Takafumi Suemune, former executive vice president and COO, became the new president.
Our readers may recall that Japanese sticker character production Quan has merged with cartoonist agency Wwwaap to launch a new company called Minto. We reported that this merger will allow Quan to distribute Wwwaap’s creators’ works and third-party content through Quan’s vast region-wide network in Asia while Wwwaap will be able to expand its sales channels. In addition to their own characters, Quon will be able to play a trader role in the distribution of third-party content. We wrote that the wave of webtoons originating in Korea had spread to the Japanese market, and that Kakao Japan (rebranded into Kakao Piccoma in November of 2021), the company behind the Piccoma digital comics platform, has surpassed 800 billion yen valuation (over $6 billion US) based on the success seizing that trend. It wasn’t clear whether Kakao Piccoma was a competitor or a friend for Minto as of that writing, but now it appears that the two companies have decided to join forces. Minto annoounced today that it has raised secured 660 million yen (over $500 million US) from Kakao Piccoma in addition to existing investors like Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Capital, Mizuho Capital, and OLM Ventures (the investment arm of Imagica Group)….
Our readers may recall that Japanese sticker character production Quan has merged with cartoonist agency Wwwaap to launch a new company called Minto. We reported that this merger will allow Quan to distribute Wwwaap’s creators’ works and third-party content through Quan’s vast region-wide network in Asia while Wwwaap will be able to expand its sales channels. In addition to their own characters, Quon will be able to play a trader role in the distribution of third-party content.
We wrote that the wave of webtoons originating in Korea had spread to the Japanese market, and that Kakao Japan (rebranded into Kakao Piccoma in November of 2021), the company behind the Piccoma digital comics platform, has surpassed 800 billion yen valuation (over $6 billion US) based on the success seizing that trend. It wasn’t clear whether Kakao Piccoma was a competitor or a friend for Minto as of that writing, but now it appears that the two companies have decided to join forces.
Minto annoounced today that it has raised secured 660 million yen (over $500 million US) from Kakao Piccoma in addition to existing investors like Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Capital, Mizuho Capital, and OLM Ventures (the investment arm of Imagica Group). This follows Minto’s previous round (probably a Series B round) back in February of 2010, and brought their funding sum up to date to 1.46 billion yen ($11.2 million US).
When
Minto was born after the acquisition, some readers may have sensed the
possibility that the company would expand into the Web3 business from
their new brand. In February, the company appointed Minoru Yanai, who
has been involved in several Web3 businesses, as a business development
manager. For Minto, the funding will allow them to more closely work
with Kakao Piccoma not only in webtoon but also many Web3 business
development because the latter’s parent company has more than a few web3 subsidiaries in
Korea such as Meta Bora (developing Web3 protocol Bora) and Ground X
(developing the Klaytn blockchain).
Minto started collaborating
with Kakao Piccoma five years ago to distribute Minto’s stickers on the
KakaoTalk messaging app, which later led to the great success of Minto’s
characters in Korea. Minto has also begun co-producing webtoons with
Kakao Piccoma. Also, in advertising and marketing using webtoons,
Minto’s former wwwaap team’s ability to use comics for social networking
marketing will be well served.
Minto has been selling
original NFTs, collaborating with the company’s CryptoCrystal NFT
project, and exhibiting NFTs created from the company’s creator network
on the Sandbox metaverse platform since last year. In April, the company
also started selling NFTs featuring their original characters as well
as other content from popular creators on the LINE NFT marketplace.
In this particular space, some of our readers may recall Tokyo-based Rocket Staff, acquired by anime retail giant Animate last year, has been developing webtoon businesses in the Japanese market.
Tokyo-, Bangalore-, and Zurich-based Rapyuta Robotics announced last week that it has raised 6.415 billion yen in the latest round, which Crunchbase says appears to be a series C round. This round was led by Goldman Sachs with participation from other unnamed investors. This follows their Series B round (raising JPY 700 million=$5.6 million through Series B1 + Series B2) that closed in July of 2020. The latest round brought their estimated funding sum up to date to 8.9 billion yen (about $70 million). Spun off from ETH Zurich, Rapyuta Robotics was founded in 2014 in Tokyo by CEO Gajan Mohanarajah who earned a master’s degree at Tokyo Institute of Technology followed by Ph.D at ETH Zurich. The company has developed Raputa.io, a cloud-based robotics platform for integrated operation and management of various robots from multiple manufacturers, as well as Raputa PA-AMR (pick assist-autonomous mobile robot) for logistics operations. The company plans to use the funds from the latest round to invest in marketing, partner training, and research and development to strengthen promoting the cloud platform and to accelerate the development of the picking robot solution. In conjunction with the funding, the company launched a promotional campaign which allows logistics…
Rapyuta PA-AMR Image credit: Rapyuta Robotics
Tokyo-, Bangalore-, and Zurich-based Rapyuta Robotics announced last week that it has raised 6.415 billion yen in the latest round, which Crunchbase says appears to be a series C round. This round was led by Goldman Sachs with participation from other unnamed investors. This follows their Series B round (raising JPY 700 million=$5.6 million through Series B1 + Series B2) that closed in July of 2020. The latest round brought their estimated funding sum up to date to 8.9 billion yen (about $70 million).
Spun off from ETH Zurich, Rapyuta Robotics
was founded in 2014 in Tokyo by CEO Gajan Mohanarajah who earned a
master’s degree at Tokyo Institute of Technology followed by Ph.D at ETH
Zurich. The company has developed Raputa.io, a cloud-based robotics
platform for integrated operation and management of various robots from
multiple manufacturers, as well as Raputa PA-AMR (pick assist-autonomous
mobile robot) for logistics operations.
The company plans to use the funds from the latest round to invest in marketing, partner training, and research and development to strengthen promoting the cloud platform and to accelerate the development of the picking robot solution. In conjunction with the funding, the company launched a promotional campaign which allows logistics businesses, including small and medium-sized warehouses, to use the picking robot on a testing basis to check productivity improvement for low pricing.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based double jump.tokyo, the Japanese startup developing blockchain games and NFT business, announced on Thursday that it has secured approximately 3 billion yen (about $23.1 million) to develop blockchain games and to strengthen human resources to develop games leveraging intellectual properties (IP). Investors participating in this round include: Access Ventures Amber Group Arriba Studio Circle Ventures Com2uS Group Dentsu Ventures Fenbushi Capital Infinity Ventures Crypto JAFCO Jump Crypto Next Web capital PKO Investments Polygon Ventures Protocol Labs Wemade Venture Capital Z Venture Capital The company is well known for its global smash-hit blockchain game title My Crypto Heroes. Since its launch back in April of 2018, the company has been promoting blockchain game development support programs, cross-sector projects with various domestic and international NFT-related businesses as well as leading discussions with regulatory authorities in Japan. In March, the company announced its investment in and business partnership with ForN, the company behind YGG Japan, the Japanese entity of the NFT (non-fungible token)-based global game guild DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) Yield Guild Games (YGG). Our readers may recall that the company successfully sold two street NFTs from Japanese comic title Eren the Southpaw for as much…
Tokyo-based double jump.tokyo, the Japanese startup developing blockchain games and NFT business, announced on Thursday that it has secured approximately 3 billion yen (about $23.1 million) to develop blockchain games and to strengthen human resources to develop games leveraging intellectual properties (IP).
Investors participating in this round include:
Access Ventures
Amber Group
Arriba Studio
Circle Ventures
Com2uS Group
Dentsu Ventures
Fenbushi Capital
Infinity Ventures Crypto
JAFCO
Jump Crypto
Next Web capital
PKO Investments
Polygon Ventures
Protocol Labs
Wemade Venture Capital
Z Venture Capital
The company is well known for its global smash-hit blockchain game title My Crypto Heroes. Since its launch back in April of 2018, the company has been promoting blockchain game development support programs, cross-sector projects with various domestic and international NFT-related businesses as well as leading discussions with regulatory authorities in Japan.
In March, the company announced its investment in and business partnership with ForN, the company behind YGG Japan, the Japanese entity of the NFT (non-fungible token)-based global game guild DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) Yield Guild Games (YGG). Our readers may recall that the company successfully sold two street NFTs from Japanese comic title Eren the Southpaw for as much as 332,300 ASTR (approximately $64,000) last week.
Regarding the latest funding, their CEO Hironobu Ueno says in his company’s statement,
This funding is a manifestation of our investors’ appreciation and expectation for our steady accumulation of the large-scale achievement in blockchain games and IP-based NFT content since the dawn of time in this space.
To promote the joint development of IP-based blockchain games with major game companies, the funds will be used to invest in products, partners, and DAO projects, which help strengthen and grow our group in the upcoming mass adoption phase of the blockchain game market.
Tokyo-based Anycolor, the Japanese startup behind the VTubers (short for “Virtual YouTubers”) group Nijisanji, announced on Thursday that its IPO application to list on the Tokyo Stock Exchange had been approved. The company will be listed on the TSE Growth Market on June 8 with plans to offer 30,000 shares for public subscription and to sell 174,600 shares in over-allotment options for a total of 1,114,000 shares. The underwriting will be led by Daiwa Securities and Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities while Anycolor’s ticker code will be 5032. Based on the company’s estimated issue price is 1,490 yen (about $11.5) per share, its market cap is approximately 44.6 billion yen (about $344 million). Its share price range will be released on May 23 with bookbuilding scheduled to start on May 24 and pricing on May 30. The final public offering price will be determined on May 31. According to its consolidated statement as of April of 2021, the company posted revenue of 7.63 billion yen ($58.5 million) with an ordinary profit of 1.45 billion yen ($11.2 million). Anycolor was founded in 2017 by CEO Riku Tazumi under its previous name of Ichikara. After participating in a long-term internship at Tokyo-based…
Image credit: Anycolor
Tokyo-based Anycolor, the Japanese startup behind the VTubers (short for “Virtual YouTubers”) group Nijisanji, announced on Thursday that its IPO application to list on the Tokyo Stock Exchange had been approved. The company will be listed on the TSE Growth Market on June 8 with plans to offer 30,000 shares for public subscription and to sell 174,600 shares in over-allotment options for a total of 1,114,000 shares. The underwriting will be led by Daiwa Securities and Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities while Anycolor’s ticker code will be 5032.
Based on the company’s estimated issue price is 1,490 yen (about $11.5) per share, its market cap is approximately 44.6 billion yen (about $344 million). Its share price range will be released on May 23 with bookbuilding scheduled to start on May 24 and pricing on May 30. The final public offering price will be determined on May 31. According to its consolidated statement as of April of 2021, the company posted revenue of 7.63 billion yen ($58.5 million) with an ordinary profit of 1.45 billion yen ($11.2 million).
Anycolor was founded in 2017 by CEO Riku
Tazumi under its previous name of Ichikara. After participating in a
long-term internship at Tokyo-based web solution provider GaiaX, he took
a leave of absence of Waseda University to launch the company.
Subsequently he launched Nijisanji in 2018 followed by rebranding the
company into Anycolor in May of 2021.
According to Japanese web access analysis startup UserLocal, the Nijisanji group is comprised of over 110 VTubers who are followed by 39 million subscribing viewers on their YouTube channels. Anycolor’s expanded support for the VTubers has improved the quality of their video clips, which contributed to increasing viewing time and subscribing viewers on YouTube, eventually the revenue from live streaming. The company is also focused on merchandising fan goods as well as receiving orders for influencer marketing campaigns from companies.
Led by CEO Tazumi (43.11%), the company’s major shareholders include LC Fund (a fund of China’s Legend Capital, 10.29%), HODE HK (Hong Kong-based subsidiary of Chinese video giant Bilibili, 7.34%), Skyland Ventures (6.91%), Sony Music Entertainment (5.14%), Ken Honda (Founder of Freakout Holdings, 4.61%), Shinya Tsurui (Anycolor’s CFO, 3.00%), and Influencer Investment Holdings (subsidiary of Adways, 3.50%).
Japanese startup Manabie has been developing a digital transformation platform for teaching and administration tasks at educational institutions. The company announced on Wednesday that it has secured about 1.5 billion yen (about $12 million US) from Globis Capital Partners (GCP), Chiba Dojo Fund, and Genesia Ventures in a Series A round. This follows angel and seed rounds (raising $4.8 million in total) announced in April of 2020 and an extended seed round ($3 million) in March of 2021. The latest round brought the company’s funding sum up to date to about 2.2 billion yen (about $17 million). Manabie was founded in January 2020 by Takuya Homma (now CEO of Manabie), who previously founded UK startup Quipper, which was acquired by Recruit for 4.8 billion yen (about $39 million) in 2015, and had been involved in operating Recruit’s “Study Suppli” app in Japan through the PMI (Post-merger Integration) process. Manabie is focused on digitalizing educational institutions in contrast to Quipper which had been helping people gain access to education. Honma told us that there’s no major differences in teaching and school operations between countries or regions. While Quipper had been operating in Asian countries, Manabie is currently being used predominantly in…
Image credit: Manabie
Japanese startup Manabie has been developing a digital transformation platform for teaching and administration tasks at educational institutions. The company announced on Wednesday that it has secured about 1.5 billion yen (about $12 million US) from Globis Capital Partners (GCP), Chiba Dojo Fund, and Genesia Ventures in a Series A round.
This follows angel and seed rounds (raising $4.8 million in total) announced in April of 2020 and an extended seed round ($3 million) in March of 2021. The latest round brought the company’s funding sum up to date to about 2.2 billion yen (about $17 million).
Manabie was founded in January 2020 by Takuya Homma (now CEO of Manabie), who previously founded UK startup Quipper, which was acquired by Recruit for 4.8 billion yen (about $39 million) in 2015, and had been involved in operating Recruit’s “Study Suppli” app in Japan through the PMI (Post-merger Integration) process. Manabie is focused on digitalizing educational institutions in contrast to Quipper which had been helping people gain access to education.
Image credit: Manabie
Honma told us that there’s no major differences in teaching and school operations between countries or regions. While Quipper had been operating in Asian countries, Manabie is currently being used predominantly in Japan, in addition to Asia. In Japan, the government’s GIGA School Initiative has helped bring the digitalization to compulsory education schools to some extent, but there are still challenges for higher education and private cram schools, according to the company.
The Manabie system can be called ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system for educational institutions. More than 100 engineers in eight countries are engaged in the development. Honma expects to use the funds from the latest round to expand the engineering team to about twice as many. The COVID-19 pandemic pushes forward SaaS adoption in the education space, and the company intends to leverage this momentum for further growth.
Masaru Ikeda
The Bridge
