Masaru started his career as a programmer/engineer, and previously co-founded several system integration companies and consulting firms. He’s been traveling around Silicon Valley and Asia exploring the IT industry, and he also curates event updates for the Tokyo edition of Startup Digest.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based startup Yuno Group today launched a crowdfunding site focused on live musical performances. It enables music fans in Japan to collaboratively invite their favorite artists from overseas. The new site is called Alive (alive.mu). The number of live performance events hosting musicians from the overseas has been gradually decreasing. For those in the event business, there is always the risk of poor sales or way too many vacant seats, and that may scare organizers away from inviting niche artists. But this new crowdfunding platform receives ticket orders prior to organizing an event, and the artist will be invited when the number of advanced orders reaches a preset target. In this way, the platform reduces the chance of an unsuccessful event. It is a similar business model to on-demand theater service Dreampass which was acquired by Yahoo Japan back in March. As of today, the platform has five crowdfunding projects available: Blue Hawaii – An electronic music duo from Montreal, Canada. The band’s latest album Untogether features acoustic folk and electronic sounds. San Cisco – An Australian four-piece indie pop band formed in 2009. Awkward, a single from their first album San Cisco, has…
Tokyo-based startup Yuno Group today launched a crowdfunding site focused on live musical performances. It enables music fans in Japan to collaboratively invite their favorite artists from overseas. The new site is called Alive (alive.mu).
The number of live performance events hosting musicians from the overseas has been gradually decreasing. For those in the event business, there is always the risk of poor sales or way too many vacant seats, and that may scare organizers away from inviting niche artists. But this new crowdfunding platform receives ticket orders prior to organizing an event, and the artist will be invited when the number of advanced orders reaches a preset target. In this way, the platform reduces the chance of an unsuccessful event. It is a similar business model to on-demand theater service Dreampass which was acquired by Yahoo Japan back in March.
As of today, the platform has five crowdfunding projects available:
Blue Hawaii – An electronic music duo from Montreal, Canada. The band’s latest album Untogether features acoustic folk and electronic sounds.
San Cisco – An Australian four-piece indie pop band formed in 2009. Awkward, a single from their first album San Cisco, has over 5 million views on YouTube.
Crocodiles – An indie pop band from San Diego. Their sound has typically been likened to The Jesus and Mary Chain and Stone Roses because of their psychedelic pop style. They have performed all across Europe.
XXYYXX – A 17-year-old electronic musician and producer from Orlando, Florida. His style has been likened to James Blake and Burial because of his experimental lo-fi music.
Nouvelle Vague – A French pop cover band known for punk rock, post-punk, new wave, and their use of ’60s bossa nova-style arrangements.
The Alive team was founded by British neuroscientist Sam Mokhtary and Japanese UI designer Yutaka Fujiki. They are based at PAX Coworking, a space here in Tokyo. It seems their team is comprised of many people from music startup Nana.
In this space, we’ve already seen some websites providing showbiz-focused crowdfunding projects, such as UK-based Songkick and Brazil’s WeDemand (previously known as Queremos). The former raised $10 million from Sequoia Capital last year, which is a good indication of the potential in this sector.
See the original story in Japanese. Yokohama-based Gamba, the startup behind the business reporting tool of the same name, announced today that it has raised $20 million yen (approximately $200,00) from Skyland Ventures, a Japanese investment company focused on seed-stage startups. Some of our readers may recall when we reported back in July that their tool would be integrated with a number of code- and task-tracking tools: GitHub, BitBucket, Pivotal Tracker and Google Tasks. The company was launched last December by Masahiro Morita who previously worked with e-commerce giant Rakuten as a business development producer. As of July, it has acquired more than 1,000 corporate accounts in Japan across a wide range of companies. For sales representatives or engineers, the app provides an easy way to share your updates with colleagues or management, at the beginning and the end of business hours. For management who have difficulties finding time to speak with employees face-to-face, it provides information on the progression of tasks as well as information about what are employees are working on. Among social tools available for enterprises, we’ve recently seen big developments like corporate messaging tool Yammer’s, acquired last year by Microsoft, and Australian business tool startup Atlassian,…
Yokohama-based Gamba, the startup behind the business reporting tool of the same name, announced today that it has raised $20 million yen (approximately $200,00) from Skyland Ventures, a Japanese investment company focused on seed-stage startups. Some of our readers may recall when we reported back in July that their tool would be integrated with a number of code- and task-tracking tools: GitHub, BitBucket, Pivotal Tracker and Google Tasks.
The company was launched last December by Masahiro Morita who previously worked with e-commerce giant Rakuten as a business development producer. As of July, it has acquired more than 1,000 corporate accounts in Japan across a wide range of companies. For sales representatives or engineers, the app provides an easy way to share your updates with colleagues or management, at the beginning and the end of business hours. For management who have difficulties finding time to speak with employees face-to-face, it provides information on the progression of tasks as well as information about what are employees are working on.
For Skyland Ventures, this is the largest of its investments to date. The company’s portfolio also includes Wonder Graphics, a company specializing in video explainers; Hachimenroppi, which does food distribution for restaurants; and Creofuga, a vertical social network for musical composers.
Ptmind is the Tokyo-based startup behind access analytics tool Miapex. The company recently announced that it will expand to serve global customers, and set up an office in Silicon Valley by the end of this year. The tool allows users to analyze visitor access to websites, as well as better understand their experience on your website, regardless of whether you are on desktop or mobile. In this space, there are already more than a few competitors including Google Analytics, Clicky, clicktale, Crazyegg, and Heatmaps. To differentiate from these services, the company aims to give more visual, more intimate access to real-time analytics by providing traffic heatmaps and compatibility tests for multiple mobile browsers, and click-through heatmap reports. The company was originally launched back in 2007 by graduates from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It has been trying to acquire users in the Chinese market but was forced to shut down after its investor folded due to the global financial crisis. In 2010, the team revived as PtThink China and founded a Japanese subsidiary in Tokyo as Ptmind. Ptmind has been generating its main revenue stream in Japan over the last few years. In addition to the recent announcement of its…
Ptmind is the Tokyo-based startup behind access analytics tool Miapex. The company recently announced that it will expand to serve global customers, and set up an office in Silicon Valley by the end of this year.
The tool allows users to analyze visitor access to websites, as well as better understand their experience on your website, regardless of whether you are on desktop or mobile. In this space, there are already more than a few competitors including Google Analytics, Clicky, clicktale, Crazyegg, and Heatmaps. To differentiate from these services, the company aims to give more visual, more intimate access to real-time analytics by providing traffic heatmaps and compatibility tests for multiple mobile browsers, and click-through heatmap reports.
The company was originally launched back in 2007 by graduates from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It has been trying to acquire users in the Chinese market but was forced to shut down after its investor folded due to the global financial crisis. In 2010, the team revived as PtThink China and founded a Japanese subsidiary in Tokyo as Ptmind.
Ptmind has been generating its main revenue stream in Japan over the last few years. In addition to the recent announcement of its partnership with Softbank BB, Softbank’s internet service provider, the company released an English edition of its tool and plans to set up a Silicon Valley office.
See the original story in Japanese. It’s been three months since I visited Luxembourg for ICT Spring 2013. Interestingly one Japanese startup, Skeed, recently launched an office there as its base for their service expansions in the European region. Skeed is a Tokyo-based startup focused on developing a high-speed data transmission technology [1]. The company is perhaps best known for its SSBP (Skeed Silver Bullet) Protocol, which optimizes the delivery of file and data transfer between multiple locations. Since the technology will not put a heavy processing load on your PC or mobile, it makes it easier for potential clients to adopt it. It can also compensate for the inherent shortcomings of TCP and improve transmission efficiency better than conventional FTP-based file transfers. So it provides great value for mobile carriers or internet service providers, which often struggle with bandwidth congestion. This SSBP technology was originally developed by Dr. Isamu Kaneko, known for having developed P2P-based file sharing software Winny. Readers may remember that he suddenly passed away back in July. Authorities harassed him for this file sharing software, but his technology was reborn as a solution to underlie the rich media era. Mobile gaming developers these days are paying…
It’s been three months since I visited Luxembourg for ICT Spring 2013. Interestingly one Japanese startup, Skeed, recently launched an office there as its base for their service expansions in the European region. Skeed is a Tokyo-based startup focused on developing a high-speed data transmission technology [1].
The company is perhaps best known for its SSBP (Skeed Silver Bullet) Protocol, which optimizes the delivery of file and data transfer between multiple locations. Since the technology will not put a heavy processing load on your PC or mobile, it makes it easier for potential clients to adopt it. It can also compensate for the inherent shortcomings of TCP and improve transmission efficiency better than conventional FTP-based file transfers. So it provides great value for mobile carriers or internet service providers, which often struggle with bandwidth congestion.
This SSBP technology was originally developed by Dr. Isamu Kaneko, known for having developed P2P-based file sharing software Winny. Readers may remember that he suddenly passed away back in July. Authorities harassed him for this file sharing software, but his technology was reborn as a solution to underlie the rich media era.
Mobile gaming developers these days are paying special attention to new technologies that can help their traffic mitigation efforts. We can expect many of them start using the startup’s technology in their mobile apps or gaming platforms very soon.
Skeed’s pitch at ICT Spring 2013 (by Nariaki Hatta)
Among the Japanese startups which participated in the event, Anydoor (known for crowdsourced translation service Conyac) and Chatwork (knowledge sharing tool for business) have already announced intention to launch their offices in Luxembourg.↩
Tokyo-based Luxa, the startup running a members-only discount e-commerce platform, has announced today that it has raised 330 million yen ($3.3 million) from KDDI Open Innovation Fund, the fund operated by Japanese telco KDDI. Prior to this funding, the company raised a total of investment worth over $10 million from Japanese investment company Jafco. Coinciding with these new funds, Luxa plans to provide limited-offer discounts to mobile subscribers via au SmartPass, the telco’s flat-rate app subscription program. Since its initial launch back in August of 2010, the website has acquired over 450,000 members, mostly people in their 30s and 40s. Their products are wide-ranging, with a heavy slant towards cosmetics and appliances. The company claims that its smartphone access ratio has risen from 8% to 35%, which indicates a rapid transition of users from desktop to mobile both in revenue and traffic [1]. With this new partnership with KDDI, the startup expects to boost its user base to 4.5 million by the end of 2016. KDDI also revealed that it has invested in iRidge, the startup behind an O2O (online-to-offline) solution using mobile geolocation and notification features. The investment sum was undisclosed. This year, the telco has invested in several…
Tokyo-based Luxa, the startup running a members-only discount e-commerce platform, has announced today that it has raised 330 million yen ($3.3 million) from KDDI Open Innovation Fund, the fund operated by Japanese telco KDDI. Prior to this funding, the company raised a total of investment worth over $10 million from Japanese investment company Jafco. Coinciding with these new funds, Luxa plans to provide limited-offer discounts to mobile subscribers via au SmartPass, the telco’s flat-rate app subscription program.
Luxa’s storefront for KDDI mobile subscribers only
Since its initial launch back in August of 2010, the website has acquired over 450,000 members, mostly people in their 30s and 40s. Their products are wide-ranging, with a heavy slant towards cosmetics and appliances.
The company claims that its smartphone access ratio has risen from 8% to 35%, which indicates a rapid transition of users from desktop to mobile both in revenue and traffic [1]. With this new partnership with KDDI, the startup expects to boost its user base to 4.5 million by the end of 2016.
KDDI also revealed that it has invested in iRidge, the startup behind an O2O (online-to-offline) solution using mobile geolocation and notification features. The investment sum was undisclosed.
This year, the telco has invested in several other e-commerce startups, including Origami and Monoco. This indicates how the company plans to leverage its huge user base, developing an entirely new revenue stream, making it more than a conventional dumb pipe business.
See the original story in Japanese. This is a part of our coverage of B Dash Camp Osaka 2013. Here in Japan we’ve recently seen several efforts to connect startups and established companies, like Morning Pitch and Creww’s Ignition Night. In Japan, most incubation programs run by corporate venture capital initiatives aim to let their employees understand the startup culture and get a sense of the creative atmosphere. So in this way, established companies and startups can complement each other, and such efforts will likely be more frequent across the local startup scene. On a day two of B Dash Camp in Osaka last week, we heard more on this topic from Microsoft Japan evengelist Shinichiro Isago, NTT Docomo Ventures managing director Daisuke Miyoshi, and Dentsu [1] senior director Fumijiko Nakajima. This session was moderated by Shuji Honjo, visiting professor at Tama Graduate School of Business, Tokyo. According to Nakajima, Dentsu focuses on three factors when partnering with startups: ideas, entrepreneurship, and technology. Under a well-known project dubbed Neurowear, the company has developed several products like as Nekomimi and Miko, which were also exhibited at SXSW back in March. His team is currently exploring business models for these products. He…
Here in Japan we’ve recently seen several efforts to connect startups and established companies, like Morning Pitch and Creww’s Ignition Night. In Japan, most incubation programs run by corporate venture capital initiatives aim to let their employees understand the startup culture and get a sense of the creative atmosphere.
So in this way, established companies and startups can complement each other, and such efforts will likely be more frequent across the local startup scene. On a day two of B Dash Camp in Osaka last week, we heard more on this topic from Microsoft Japan evengelist Shinichiro Isago, NTT Docomo Ventures managing director Daisuke Miyoshi, and Dentsu [1] senior director Fumijiko Nakajima. This session was moderated by Shuji Honjo, visiting professor at Tama Graduate School of Business, Tokyo.
Dentsu’s Fumihiko Nakajima
According to Nakajima, Dentsu focuses on three factors when partnering with startups: ideas, entrepreneurship, and technology. Under a well-known project dubbed Neurowear, the company has developed several products like as Nekomimi and Miko, which were also exhibited at SXSW back in March. His team is currently exploring business models for these products.
He also shared some of the projects that the company is working on in collaboration with other companies:
Draffic: Developed in association with Japanese GIS company Zenrin Datacom, this system visualizes how many people were located in a specific time at a specific location. It is expected to be used by local governments to consider a disaster evacuation plan.
Asoberu-T: Developed in association with Japanese fashion retailer Beams, this solution lets users experience augmented reality on T-shirts. We featured this product back in July.
Social Marathon: Using RFID technology, this service collects time lapses of runners at a marathon and automatically publish their updates via social networks to more motivate them to keep running.
Dentsu Science Jam: This is a joint venture with Japanese web conglomerate Digital Garage, aiming to create commercial services based on cutting-edge research in science.
draffic
According to Miyoshi, NTT Docomo Ventures aims for capital gain, but for startups, they expect to be seen as a gateway to all NTT group companies.
At a huge conglomerate like NTT Group, you may have no idea how to connect with a certain department. We will find the right person in the right department, corresponding to what you’re looking for, and link you up with them. We will work with you to explore how a department can make the most of your technology.
Since our company is a mobile carrier, we tend to be more constrained, so we will need more time to launch a new business than a typical startup does. By collaborating with startups which typically have lots of knowledge about new businesses, we would like to accelerate our internal entrepreneurial efforts as well.
One of the trends popular with our executives currently is the health care business. If you can bring us a health care solution, we can probably explore a potential business partnership.
For startups from outside Japan, they welcome any types of your approach. But they highly recommend you to visit them with a Japanese interpreter.
Microsoft’s Shinichiro Isago
Microsoft launched Microsoft Ventures from its US headquarters back in July. And Microsoft Japan is preparing to launch its Japanese counterpart, providing startups with support such as BizSpark, an acceleration program, and seed funding opportunities ranging from 5 million yen to 30 million yen (from $50,000 to $300,000).
In a response to a question about what kind of startups they can support, Microsoft’s Isago shared an interesting story:
In Saga prefecture, the local government decided to distribute our tablets to all high school students in the prefecture. … Our challenge is we have little variety of apps for Windows Tablets. So we really want to support startups which can provide a variety of apps for devices.
For startups, if you want to apply for Microsoft’s incubation program, you will be requested to submit a form in English, as they are a global company. Microsoft Japan can give you translation assistance, but they recommend you to personally write about what has motivated you to launch a startup, regardless of whether your English is good or not.
Moderator Honjo praised the the panelists for helping their respective companies connect with startups. In response, Microsoft’s Isago explained why.
It’s because big companies became weaker. In the past at many companies, smarter people tend to be assigned to high profit business. But for communicating with startups, you will need to be agile and responsive. Supporting startups will not help profits so much, but taking these actions with our future in mind is a good policy.
Disclosure: The author has a business relationship with Dentsu.↩
Creofuga is a startup from Japan’s western city of Okayama which has been providing an online community platform for amateur or semi-professional music composers. The company recently announced that it will launch a crowdsourcing and licensing platform for soundtracks, sound effects, and other audio. It’s called AudioStock and it is expected to launch later this month, serving social game developers. Notable clients will include SummerTime Studio, Nagisa, Tokyo Tower, and Fuji TV. Since the company started back in 2007, it has enlisted over 10,000 amateur music composers, and has partnered with Bandai Namco Games and a Japanese record company to help them promote a game title and music artist. For game developers who intend to use soundtracks or effects composed by the third parties in your apps, it may be a challenge obtain rights from license holders. But with this platform, you can buy exclusive rights for the reproduction of a music piece for 2,000 yen ($20) each or nonexclusive rights for 500 yen ($5) each. At the time of the launch, there will be 10,000 pieces of music available, varying from soundtracks to narrated samples. In addition to these, you can have your narration or music tasks crowdsourced among…
Creofuga is a startup from Japan’s western city of Okayama which has been providing an online community platform for amateur or semi-professional music composers.
The company recently announced that it will launch a crowdsourcing and licensing platform for soundtracks, sound effects, and other audio. It’s called AudioStock and it is expected to launch later this month, serving social game developers. Notable clients will include SummerTime Studio, Nagisa, Tokyo Tower, and Fuji TV.
Since the company started back in 2007, it has enlisted over 10,000 amateur music composers, and has partnered with Bandai Namco Games and a Japanese record company to help them promote a game title and music artist.
For game developers who intend to use soundtracks or effects composed by the third parties in your apps, it may be a challenge obtain rights from license holders. But with this platform, you can buy exclusive rights for the reproduction of a music piece for 2,000 yen ($20) each or nonexclusive rights for 500 yen ($5) each. At the time of the launch, there will be 10,000 pieces of music available, varying from soundtracks to narrated samples. In addition to these, you can have your narration or music tasks crowdsourced among workers on the platform. When a deal is closed between you and a worker, the startup will take a 30% commission and the rest goes to the worker.
Shuichiro Nishio
The company has also partnered with Japanese stock photo giant Amana Images, and will use them as a sales channel to better reach potential clients in need of music and sound effects. Regarding the platform’s global expansions, the startup’s CEO Shuichiro Nishio unveiled that his team is currently developing an English version expected to launch by the end of this year. He says there’s likely to be huge potential in the overseas market since many foreign developers also are in need of high quality music from Japan.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Hachimenroppi (named after the eight faces and six arms seen on many Buddhist statues) is a startup that does something rather unusual. It delivers fish, handling distribution services for restaurants. And apparently that business has some serious potential, as the company announced recently that it has raised 150 million yen (approximately $1.5 million) from VC firm Value Create, PR agency Vector, and logistics company Winroader. The startup’s founder and CEO Masanari Matsuda has had a unique career since he started working in the banking industry, moving on to a VC firm, and then launching two companies prior to this one. He launched this startup back in September of 2010 when he thought there was great potential in evolving fish distribution. The company buys fish from markets and brokers across the country and delivers it to Japanese izakaya restaurants or diners, according to their specific needs. The fish products industry in Japan has an annual volume of 3 trillion yen ($30.9 billion), and the startup expects to meet the demands of 300 billion yen ($3.09 billion) by the year of 2020, accounting for a 10% market share. Every single restraurant has a different need…
Tokyo-based Hachimenroppi (named after the eight faces and six arms seen on many Buddhist statues) is a startup that does something rather unusual. It delivers fish, handling distribution services for restaurants. And apparently that business has some serious potential, as the company announced recently that it has raised 150 million yen (approximately $1.5 million) from VC firm Value Create, PR agency Vector, and logistics company Winroader.
The startup’s founder and CEO Masanari Matsuda has had a unique career since he started working in the banking industry, moving on to a VC firm, and then launching two companies prior to this one. He launched this startup back in September of 2010 when he thought there was great potential in evolving fish distribution.
The company buys fish from markets and brokers across the country and delivers it to Japanese izakaya restaurants or diners, according to their specific needs. The fish products industry in Japan has an annual volume of 3 trillion yen ($30.9 billion), and the startup expects to meet the demands of 300 billion yen ($3.09 billion) by the year of 2020, accounting for a 10% market share.
Every single restraurant has a different need regarding what kind of fish or how many fish are needed day to day. On the other hand, what fish are available very much depends on changing [environmental] conditions. So matching the needs of restaurants with supplies from the market can be compared to doing a huge jigsaw puzzle. We facilitate this by making the most of digital technologies.
From an outsider’s perspective, the fish distribution business is fiercely competitive because of the abundance of Japanese izakaya restaurant chains. But according to Matsuda, this intense competition is happening only in the area inside Tokyo’s Yamanote loopline (the center of Tokyo), and the whole distribution system works based on supply in the rest of the country. He added:
When we get an order from restaurants, we’ll not be able to refuse their orders because there was a poor catch. A direct delivery from ports is good in providing fresh fish to restaurants, but it’s not good at all times because a poor catch directly results in unavailable dishes on their menus. We can understand the needs of restaurants and propose alternative options to them. This is our value.
Hachimenroppi’s app for restaurant chefs and cooks
In order to do this the startup’s employees periodically visit restaurants/clients to establish better communications with their chefs. Interestingly, no specific personnel is assigned to each client, but any updates about restaurants collected by the employees are shared within their startup using Evernote. This means that any of their employees can visit clients, translating into greater potential for their business scalability.
Matsuda thinks that delivering top quality fish to consumers is their duty. With these new funds raised, they plan to develop a system that proposes fish recipes to chefs or cooks using smart tablets.
Instead of removing middlemen from the distribution process, which typical discount retailers often do, the company attempts to evolve the entire industry using digital solutions. If their service helps consumers eat better quality fish and if it helps fishermen earn more, it should certainly boost the fishing industry as a whole.
Similar to Hachimenroppi, we’ve seen more than a few Japanese startups trying to evolve conventional businesses using digital technologies, including Raksul (printing) and LeNet (laundry). We’ll feature a more comprehensive list of such startups soon, so stay tuned!
Last weekend at the Microsoft Japan office in Tokyo, the eighth edition of the Samurai Venture Summit took place. This is a semi-annual startup exhibition event run by Samurai Incubate. Here’s a quick rundown of the entrepreneurs that caught our eye at the event. Quick Money Recorder Quick Money Recorder (or ‘Okanereco’ in Japanese) is a personal finance app (for iOS and Android) that allows you to record your daily expenses on mobile. Our readers may recall similar apps such as Dr. Wallet, Zaim, Money Forward, ReceReco, and Money Tree. But this app recently ranked number one in the Japanese App Store’s finance app category, and is currently ranked second. Smart Idea’s Shohei Ejiri, an ex-Nokia Japan employee and the creator of the app, says the appeal of the app is that it lets you input an expense in as little as two seconds. The app was developed in Vietnam, where system development is very cost effective. Flip Friday When a new fashion season arrives for retailers, there are usually many items left unsold. Retailers look for discounters to buy up leftovers, but it’s difficult since the stock is already out of season or not current. Flip Friday has a…
Last weekend at the Microsoft Japan office in Tokyo, the eighth edition of the Samurai Venture Summit took place. This is a semi-annual startup exhibition event run by Samurai Incubate. Here’s a quick rundown of the entrepreneurs that caught our eye at the event.
Quick Money Recorder
Smart Idea’s Shohei Ejiri
Quick Money Recorder (or ‘Okanereco’ in Japanese) is a personal finance app (for iOS and Android) that allows you to record your daily expenses on mobile. Our readers may recall similar apps such as Dr. Wallet, Zaim, Money Forward, ReceReco, and Money Tree. But this app recently ranked number one in the Japanese App Store’s finance app category, and is currently ranked second.
Smart Idea’s Shohei Ejiri, an ex-Nokia Japan employee and the creator of the app, says the appeal of the app is that it lets you input an expense in as little as two seconds. The app was developed in Vietnam, where system development is very cost effective.
When a new fashion season arrives for retailers, there are usually many items left unsold. Retailers look for discounters to buy up leftovers, but it’s difficult since the stock is already out of season or not current.
Flip Friday has a warehouse in Los Angeles, buying branded fashions from local retailers for discount prices. The company will deliver them to Japan, selling them to fashion concious folks for affordable rates using its fashion e-commerce site.
The company was originally launched as an incubated startup at D2C, a joint venture of NTT Docomo and ad agency Dentsu.
When the earthquake hit Japan in 2011, many people not only lost their family members, but also photos and photobooks of family as well. Watching the news about the tragedy, Mr. and Mrs. Ota wanted to invent something to help people get over losing memorable photos.
The startup has developed a photobook app that allows users to keep videos or photos in a well-organized format. If you lose your device, there’s no need to worry about data loss since everything is stored in the cloud. Albums are also provided in e-pub format, so users can browse photos with an e-pub compatible browser even if the startup were to shut down.
The company is backed by Tokyo-based incubator Movida Japan.
Similar to ApexPeak which recently launched in Singapore, Paid provides advanced payments on your billings to your clients. It can also take over your invoicing or billing work, as well as payment collection. In this way, you don’t need to worry about possible delays in collections or demands for payments.
Tokyo-based Raccoon, the company behind the service, has been a middleman service in the fashion industry, giving fashion retailers a chance to deal with well-established suppliers.
Also presenting was Japanese entrepreneur Yorihiko Paul Kato, who is based in Singapore. He has produced a movie filmed in Hong Kong, Seoul, and Osaka, staring up-and-coming actors from those countries. The movie, entitled Fly Me To Minami will be showing from December and early-bird ticket buyers can put their names in the end credits. Minami, literally meaning the south in Japanese, is an alias for the southern district of central Osaka.
See the original story in Japanese. When loved ones pass away, sometimes we might imagine that they became a star shining in the night sky. But one startup is looking to make this idea a reality. San Francisco-based Elysium Space, a company providing space memorial services, announced it has launched its business in the Japanese market on Monday, following its US launch back in August. Elysium delivers the ashes of a deceased family member into the space for as little as $1,990. You can even send the ashes of your pet as well. Coinciding with its launch in Japan, we had a chance to speak with ex-NASA engineer and the startup’s founder and CEO Thomas Civeit. He says they plan to have their own spacecraft but are still exploring better ways to deliver the ashes. At this point, they plan to partner with space transport companies like Space X, asking them to launch a spacecraft for delivery from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. He explained: There are many options for rocket launch sites but they are typically surrounded by off-limits areas. For our customers who are willing to watch the launch scene, I believe Florida is the best of them….
When loved ones pass away, sometimes we might imagine that they became a star shining in the night sky. But one startup is looking to make this idea a reality.
San Francisco-based Elysium Space, a company providing space memorial services, announced it has launched its business in the Japanese market on Monday, following its US launch back in August. Elysium delivers the ashes of a deceased family member into the space for as little as $1,990. You can even send the ashes of your pet as well.
Coinciding with its launch in Japan, we had a chance to speak with ex-NASA engineer and the startup’s founder and CEO Thomas Civeit. He says they plan to have their own spacecraft but are still exploring better ways to deliver the ashes. At this point, they plan to partner with space transport companies like Space X, asking them to launch a spacecraft for delivery from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. He explained:
There are many options for rocket launch sites but they are typically surrounded by off-limits areas. For our customers who are willing to watch the launch scene, I believe Florida is the best of them.
Disney World is located nearby, where you can visit with your family members after watching the launch. It may be possible to partner with travel agencies to arrange a tour having those destinations.
The launch scene will be live-streamed as well as recorded so that family can watch without visiting the launch site. He adds:
A funeral service in space is not a new concept at all. What’s innovative here is that we can provide it for as little as US$1,990.
There are space-focused ventures elsewhere but most of them are government funded. In contrast, our company is completely funded from private investors.
We also asked about possible concerns people may have in Japan (should they fall from space), as water burial is illegal here. But it seems their service would not result in any legal trouble since the spacecraft would be launched from the US.
The company has already introduced mobile apps for iOS and Android, where you can preview the kind of experience you will get through the service. In addition to accepting applications via its website, Elysium is in talk with Japanese funeral services for potential partnerships.
From the left: Benjamin Joffe (Director of Communication), Thomas Civeit (CEO), Naruo Kanemoto (Director of Business Development)
