See the original story in Japanese. NTT Docomo Ventures [1], the incubation arm of Japan’s largest telco, unveiled its new office today, which features a co-working space and an event space for its startups. The company launched an incubation program called Docomo Innovation village back in February. 124 startups initially applied for inclusion, and six teams of those made the cut for the first batch in April. The selected teams will receive grants of 2 million yen (approximately $20,000) each, as well as support in the form of work spaces and mentoring. The participating teams explained their reasoning for applying to the program, citing Docomo’s successful investment in Evernote and possible partnerships opportunities with the telco as potential benefits of inclusion. Regarding their experiences at the incubation program thus far, they say they have learned much from mentors, with lots of opportunities to reach other companies through Docomo’s business network, helping them learn more about app development. They are obliged to visit the office at least every Tuesday, where they have a meeting to share recent developments with each other. These six teams will unveil the results of their six-month incubation program on Thursday, September 26th. Previously known as Docomo Innovation Ventures,…
NTT Docomo Ventures[1], the incubation arm of Japan’s largest telco, unveiled its new office today, which features a co-working space and an event space for its startups.
The company launched an incubation program called Docomo Innovation village back in February. 124 startups initially applied for inclusion, and six teams of those made the cut for the first batch in April. The selected teams will receive grants of 2 million yen (approximately $20,000) each, as well as support in the form of work spaces and mentoring.
The participating teams explained their reasoning for applying to the program, citing Docomo’s successful investment in Evernote and possible partnerships opportunities with the telco as potential benefits of inclusion.
Representatives of the 6 first batch teams
Regarding their experiences at the incubation program thus far, they say they have learned much from mentors, with lots of opportunities to reach other companies through Docomo’s business network, helping them learn more about app development. They are obliged to visit the office at least every Tuesday, where they have a meeting to share recent developments with each other.
These six teams will unveil the results of their six-month incubation program on Thursday, September 26th.
Previously known as Docomo Innovation Ventures, but it was rebranded on July 1st, 2013. ↩
Today Bracket, the company behind Stores.jp, announced that it has been acquired by Start Today. Start Today is, of course, the operator of Japanese fashion commerce giant Zozotown. Since news of the acquisition was released a few hours ago, it has dominated social feeds here in Japan. Bracket was founded back in October of 2008, and the company operates serveral online services including a C2C car sharing site Cafore and custom made ladies shoes service, Shoes of Prey. Stores.jp lets users to make their own online shop in matter of minutes for a monthly fee of 980 yen (about $10). Since it launched back in September of 2012, it has been used to create more than 40,000 online stores to date, and that is projected to surpass 100,000 by the end of this year. Considering that 70% of stores on Stores.jp are fashion related, it makes sense for the company to choose Start Today as a partner. The two companies will work together to enhance each other’s services. Zozotown and Stores.jp will be heavily integrated, allowing brands on Stores.jp to set up shop on Zozotown without the hassle of registering product and inventory information, since all data is seemlessly integrated…
Today Bracket, the company behind Stores.jp, announced that it has been acquired by Start Today. Start Today is, of course, the operator of Japanese fashion commerce giant Zozotown. Since news of the acquisition was released a few hours ago, it has dominated social feeds here in Japan.
Bracket was founded back in October of 2008, and the company operates serveral online services including a C2C car sharing site Cafore and custom made ladies shoes service, Shoes of Prey.
Stores.jp lets users to make their own online shop in matter of minutes for a monthly fee of 980 yen (about $10). Since it launched back in September of 2012, it has been used to create more than 40,000 online stores to date, and that is projected to surpass 100,000 by the end of this year. Considering that 70% of stores on Stores.jp are fashion related, it makes sense for the company to choose Start Today as a partner.
The two companies will work together to enhance each other’s services. Zozotown and Stores.jp will be heavily integrated, allowing brands on Stores.jp to set up shop on Zozotown without the hassle of registering product and inventory information, since all data is seemlessly integrated on the backend.
The startup’s direct competitor is Base, which has likely pushed Stores.jp to hustle by adding many additional services, including professional product photography, original business cards for shops, and most recently, making virtual 3D stores through a partnership with Panoplaza.
You can see in our previously published interactive acquisition timeline that buyouts often take place in the online gaming sector. We hope that this news will serve as encouragement for more up-and-coming startups, especially in the e-commerce space. Similarly, it would be great if we can see more larger internet companies seeking young startups who are making true innovations in the mobile and internet space.
If you’d like to learn more about how Stores.jp works, check out the video below.
See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based United, the company behind the popular homescreen decoration app CocoPPa, announced today it has started looking for third-party content holders in the character business as possible collaborators. The startup is planning to provide app users with paid content this coming fall, and hopefully by partnering with many content holders it can accumulate a rich variety of wallpapers and icons. This will be CocoPPa’s first attempt at monetizing. Some of our readers may recall that the company has partnered with Tokyo Otaku Mode, bringing illustrations from TOM to their smartphone homescreens. This collaboration provided content for free, but in the future users will pay to get icons or wallpapers featuring popular characters from prominent IP holders. When we think about this kind of business models, Line Corporation’s paid stickers also come to mind. According to that company, sticker sales generated revenue worth 1.74 billion yen ($17.4 million) in the three months from January to March, accounting for 30% of their overall income, with most of that coming from users in Japan. But when we look at the demographics of CocoPPa users (see below), they are mostly women in their early 20s, with 86% of…
Tokyo-based United, the company behind the popular homescreen decoration app CocoPPa, announced today it has started looking for third-party content holders in the character business as possible collaborators.
The startup is planning to provide app users with paid content this coming fall, and hopefully by partnering with many content holders it can accumulate a rich variety of wallpapers and icons.
This will be CocoPPa’s first attempt at monetizing. Some of our readers may recall that the company has partnered with Tokyo Otaku Mode, bringing illustrations from TOM to their smartphone homescreens. This collaboration provided content for free, but in the future users will pay to get icons or wallpapers featuring popular characters from prominent IP holders.
When we think about this kind of business models, Line Corporation’s paid stickers also come to mind. According to that company, sticker sales generated revenue worth 1.74 billion yen ($17.4 million) in the three months from January to March, accounting for 30% of their overall income, with most of that coming from users in Japan. But when we look at the demographics of CocoPPa users (see below), they are mostly women in their early 20s, with 86% of users coming from outside Japan. So it will be interesting to see if such an internationally-focused app can generate revenue in this way.
CocoPPa has already surpassed 10 million downloads in its first 11 months since the launch. If you are interested in partnering with them, feel free to apply over on their website.
If you haven’t yet tried the CocoPPa app, it is available for free on iOS and Android. The iOS app was launched back on July 26th, 2012, and the Android version followed on May 29th, 2013. As of June 22nd, iOS accounts for 90% of the app’s total downloads.
One Japanese organization has a pretty awesome Kickstarter project going on right now, trying to put the ‘fun’ back in Fundoshi, a form of traditional Japanese underwear. The effort comes from the Japanese Fundoshi Association, teaming up with Kayac and ShareFun on an initiative to create Manga Fundoshi. The ‘Boom’ and ‘Thud’ designs come courtesy of Kayac, certainly fun underwear for anyone who considers their nether-regions worthy of such descriptors. For backers who give over $80, you’ll receive your Fundoshi award in a beautiful masu box. For more information, do check out the promotional video below. It’s worth watching not only because it tells you all you need to know about the project, but also because the presenter, Keiji Nakagawa, strangely changes his bow-tie multiple times [1]. You can’t help but root for this project to succeed, since it not only helps promote a bit of Japanese culture, but it’s also a healthier option than the briefs that most of us wear [2]. The ‘Manga Fundoshi’ project is seeking a modest sum of $4500 before its August 31st deadline, and has so far raised $860. If you’d like to get behind this effort, drop over to their Kickstarter page and…
One Japanese organization has a pretty awesome Kickstarter project going on right now, trying to put the ‘fun’ back in Fundoshi, a form of traditional Japanese underwear. The effort comes from the Japanese Fundoshi Association, teaming up with Kayac and ShareFun on an initiative to create Manga Fundoshi.
The ‘Boom’ and ‘Thud’ designs come courtesy of Kayac, certainly fun underwear for anyone who considers their nether-regions worthy of such descriptors. For backers who give over $80, you’ll receive your Fundoshi award in a beautiful masu box.
For more information, do check out the promotional video below. It’s worth watching not only because it tells you all you need to know about the project, but also because the presenter, Keiji Nakagawa, strangely changes his bow-tie multiple times [1].
You can’t help but root for this project to succeed, since it not only helps promote a bit of Japanese culture, but it’s also a healthier option than the briefs that most of us wear [2].
The ‘Manga Fundoshi’ project is seeking a modest sum of $4500 before its August 31st deadline, and has so far raised $860. If you’d like to get behind this effort, drop over to their Kickstarter page and pledge your support. (Big thanks to Tokyo Desu for pointing this one out.
Tokyo-based stock brokerage company Crowd Securities Japan held a press briefing yesterday to announce that it will launch the country’s first investment crowdfunding platform in August. The service is called Crowd Bank. The company’s president Kaz Ohmae, explained a little about the upcoming service. People in Japan keep more than 839 trillion yen ($8.39 trillion) in their savings, more than any other country in the world. However, as little as 8.2 billion yen ($82 million) has been transacted in the Japanese crowdfunding market, less than 5% of the US [transaction volume]. So Japan has great potential for growth in the crowdfunding market. We plan to launch the country’s first investment crowdfunding platform and help SMEs raise funds easier with this service. According to Ohmae, crowdfunding services are categorized into five types corresponding to what you can get in return for investments: donations, rewards, loans, funds, and equity. Regarding the first two, these are relatively easy to launch since no license is required. But for the latter three types of crowdfunding services, operators are requested to get licenses from the Japanese monetary authority. Taking full advantage of its status as a stock brokerage company, they plan to launch a loan crowdfunding…
From the left: CSJ’s President Kaz Ohmae, Chairman Yoshito Denawa
Tokyo-based stock brokerage company Crowd Securities Japan held a press briefing yesterday to announce that it will launch the country’s first investment crowdfunding platform in August. The service is called Crowd Bank.
The company’s president Kaz Ohmae, explained a little about the upcoming service.
People in Japan keep more than 839 trillion yen ($8.39 trillion) in their savings, more than any other country in the world. However, as little as 8.2 billion yen ($82 million) has been transacted in the Japanese crowdfunding market, less than 5% of the US [transaction volume]. So Japan has great potential for growth in the crowdfunding market. We plan to launch the country’s first investment crowdfunding platform and help SMEs raise funds easier with this service.
According to Ohmae, crowdfunding services are categorized into five types corresponding to what you can get in return for investments: donations, rewards, loans, funds, and equity. Regarding the first two, these are relatively easy to launch since no license is required. But for the latter three types of crowdfunding services, operators are requested to get licenses from the Japanese monetary authority.
Taking full advantage of its status as a stock brokerage company, they plan to launch a loan crowdfunding service in August and an equity service next year. They aim to transact 10 billion yen ($100 million) among 10,000 customers using the platform by March of 2015.
The company was previously known as D-brain Securities, focused on dealing with unlisted stocks on Japanese stock exchanges (the Green Sheet Market). They have previously served more than 9,000 clients and managed underwriting for 140 companies. 16 companies of those have exited to an IPO or M&A, and to date the company has provided capital worth 10.7 billion yen ($107 million) to Japanese SMEs from the market.
Prior to joining this company, president Ohmae worked at E-Trade Japan, and was involved in an launching Exchange Corporation, the startup behind Japan’s leading social lending service Aqush.
The video below shows Ohmae giving a brief demo of how the new platform will work.
Japan’s Line Corporation has announced that it will be establishing a new location in the country’s western city of Fukuoka by the fall of 2015. This particular location is being built to help focus on the company’s Asia growth, it’s proximity to other Asian cities makes that a little easier. Line’s popular chat app has 190 million users to date, and could possibly hit 200 million later this month. The new building will be centrally located near Hakata Station, and is expected to be able to accommodate over 1000 people. This will also contribute to the local economy through job creation as well, as it looks like they are already hiring. Our readers may recall that we spend some time in Fukuoka a few months back to cover the B Dash Camp tech conference. Interestingly, one of the headline speakers at that event was Line’s CEO Akira Morikawa, who at the time explained that his company does not plan to establish regional subsidiaries in many countries – but rather operate in a more flexible manner as a sort of borderless company. So far the company has been very good at doing business in this way, and it will be interesting…
Line Corporation CEO Akira Morikawa
Japan’s Line Corporation has announced that it will be establishing a new location in the country’s western city of Fukuoka by the fall of 2015. This particular location is being built to help focus on the company’s Asia growth, it’s proximity to other Asian cities makes that a little easier.
Line’s popular chat app has 190 million users to date, and could possibly hit 200 million later this month.
The new building will be centrally located near Hakata Station, and is expected to be able to accommodate over 1000 people. This will also contribute to the local economy through job creation as well, as it looks like they are already hiring.
Our readers may recall that we spend some time in Fukuoka a few months back to cover the B Dash Camp tech conference. Interestingly, one of the headline speakers at that event was Line’s CEO Akira Morikawa, who at the time explained that his company does not plan to establish regional subsidiaries in many countries – but rather operate in a more flexible manner as a sort of borderless company.
So far the company has been very good at doing business in this way, and it will be interesting to see if they can keep winning with this game plan as they push for more share around Asia and other parts of the world.
Line will join a number of prominent Japanese tech companies have a presence in Fukuoka already, including CyberAgent, Gumi, Mixi, and Paperboy just to name a few.
For more information on the growth of Line, please check out our interactive Line Timeline which chronicles its growth from its launch back in 2011 up until the present day.
See the original story in Japanese. Terra Motors is a Tokyo-based startup manufacturing mid-range and high-end electric bikes for Asian markets. The startup held a press briefing yesterday and unveiled a brand new model called the A4000i. The new model’s big feature is connectivity with iPhones. When you set your handset on the bike’s handlebar, it will keep you updated with real-time metrics during driving, such as fuel efficiency, tracking routes, and power consumption. With this new function, the startup aims to help courier companies become more efficient in their delivery work. Their strategy is to give consumers in Asia a high-end offering, so the new bike only supports iPhone, as opposed to other smartphone devices. Its price will be around 450,000 yen (about $4,500) in Japan, and will be about the same in other Asian countries. This means the bike will not be cheap for consumers in the region, so the startup hopes that their competitive edge can be in branding rather than pricing. For the company’s mid- to long-term vision, it plans to use data collected from users to develop a new service in partnership with big data solution companies. They’re still preparing a navigation feature as well….
Terra Motors is a Tokyo-based startup manufacturing mid-range and high-end electric bikes for Asian markets. The startup held a press briefing yesterday and unveiled a brand new model called the A4000i.
The new model’s big feature is connectivity with iPhones. When you set your handset on the bike’s handlebar, it will keep you updated with real-time metrics during driving, such as fuel efficiency, tracking routes, and power consumption. With this new function, the startup aims to help courier companies become more efficient in their delivery work.
Metric monitoring interface (under development)
Their strategy is to give consumers in Asia a high-end offering, so the new bike only supports iPhone, as opposed to other smartphone devices. Its price will be around 450,000 yen (about $4,500) in Japan, and will be about the same in other Asian countries. This means the bike will not be cheap for consumers in the region, so the startup hopes that their competitive edge can be in branding rather than pricing.
For the company’s mid- to long-term vision, it plans to use data collected from users to develop a new service in partnership with big data solution companies. They’re still preparing a navigation feature as well.
Terra Motors has developed a prototype for the new model, and plans to start mass production this winter. They expect to sell more than 100,000 bikes by the end of 2015, and they’re currently inviting potential retailers and distributors from around Asia to get in touch.
Terra Motors was founded back in April of 2010, and it received investment worth of 221 million yen (or about $2 million) back in 2011. The investors include Mizuho Capital and several angel investors such as ex-Sony and ex-Google Japan CEOs.
The startup’s CEO Toru Tokushige spoke of his aspiration to be Asia’s answer to Tesla Motors in the region’s electric markets. But he’ll have a big challenge ahead.
Terra Motors’ CEO Toru Tokushige at press briefing on Thursday
NYC-based Japanese startup and online ticketing service provider Peatix announced today it has secured series A funding worth $3 million from Fidelity Growth Partners Japan, the VC and private equity arm of Fidelity Worldwide Investment. Fidelity’s Japan representative David Milstein will join the management board. The other investors include 500 Startups, Draper Nexus Venture Partners, DG Incubation, Itochu Technology Ventures, Sunbridge Global Ventures, and Zenshin Capital [1]. Peatix was co-founded back in 2009 by four Amazon.com/Amazon Japan alumni: Naofumi Iwai, Taku Harada, Emi Takemura Miller, and Yuji Fujita. To date, it has been providing an online ticketing service, facilitating over 10,000 meet-ups, conferences and events. As part of its business strategy, the startup focuses on optimizing its interface for smartphone devices, and now more than 60% of user traffic is coming from mobile. With these new funds, the startup’s CEO Taku Harada explains that the company will intensify system development, improve user experience, and push for global business expansions. The startup has moved its headquarters to NYC early this year, and recently established a subsidiary, Peatix Asia, in Singapore. DG Incubation is the investment arm of Tokyo-based startup incubator Digital Garage. Zenshin Capital is an investment fund which was founded by Silicon…
Peatix Team at Echelon 2013, Singapore (Naofumi Iwai on the left, and Emi Takemura Miller on the right)
NYC-based Japanese startup and online ticketing service provider Peatix announced today it has secured series A funding worth $3 million from Fidelity Growth Partners Japan, the VC and private equity arm of Fidelity Worldwide Investment. Fidelity’s Japan representative David Milstein will join the management board.
Peatix was co-founded back in 2009 by four Amazon.com/Amazon Japan alumni: Naofumi Iwai, Taku Harada, Emi Takemura Miller, and Yuji Fujita. To date, it has been providing an online ticketing service, facilitating over 10,000 meet-ups, conferences and events.
As part of its business strategy, the startup focuses on optimizing its interface for smartphone devices, and now more than 60% of user traffic is coming from mobile. With these new funds, the startup’s CEO Taku Harada explains that the company will intensify system development, improve user experience, and push for global business expansions.
The startup has moved its headquarters to NYC early this year, and recently established a subsidiary, Peatix Asia, in Singapore.
The growth of events using Peatix for their ticketing
DG Incubation is the investment arm of Tokyo-based startup incubator Digital Garage. Zenshin Capital is an investment fund which was founded by Silicon Valley-based Japanese entrepreneur Takeshi Mori. ↩
Two Japanese mobile trends that we have been following closely over the past few months are high-quality Japanese photo apps, and the evolution of cute culture into an exportable mobile commodity. Popular made-in-Japan collage app Papelook lies at the intersection of these two trends, and that means it has lots of potential to grow, even beyond Japan’s borders. Today Digital Garage announced that it would be investing in Papelook, though the exact sum was not disclosed, the company will take 5% of the startup’s outstanding shares. The announcement also noted that Papelook has surpassed the 6 million downloads milestone (see chart below), boasting that among teenage girl iPhone users in Japan (specifically, those aged 10 to 20) it’s estimated that one in every two have downloaded Papelook. But the app has proven popular in overseas markets, currently ranking as a top 25 iOS photo app in South Korea, Indonesia, New Zealand, and Australia. On Android, It’s performing well in South Korea, Vietnam, and Taiwan. Papelook is an Open Network Lab startup, and our readers may recall that it took the top prize at the accelerator’s Demo Day back in May. The parent company of ONL is Digital Garage. For those…
Two Japanese mobile trends that we have been following closely over the past few months are high-quality Japanese photo apps, and the evolution of cute culture into an exportable mobile commodity. Popular made-in-Japan collage app Papelook lies at the intersection of these two trends, and that means it has lots of potential to grow, even beyond Japan’s borders.
Today Digital Garage announced that it would be investing in Papelook, though the exact sum was not disclosed, the company will take 5% of the startup’s outstanding shares.
The announcement also noted that Papelook has surpassed the 6 million downloads milestone (see chart below), boasting that among teenage girl iPhone users in Japan (specifically, those aged 10 to 20) it’s estimated that one in every two have downloaded Papelook.
Papelook’s journey to 6 million downloads
But the app has proven popular in overseas markets, currently ranking as a top 25 iOS photo app in South Korea, Indonesia, New Zealand, and Australia. On Android, It’s performing well in South Korea, Vietnam, and Taiwan.
Papelook is an Open Network Lab startup, and our readers may recall that it took the top prize at the accelerator’s Demo Day back in May. The parent company of ONL is Digital Garage.
For those not familiar with Papelook, check out our demo video below from a few months back.
For western companies, entering the Asian market is no easy task. There is the inevitable language barrier, not to mention the cultural differences. We had a chance to talk to Anji Ismail, the CEO of online marketing platform DOZ, in order to hear his thoughts on what makes the Japanese market especially different. For starters, online marketing in Japan is very well-developed. According to a study by Dentsu published in March of this year, online marketing budgets in Japan grew by 107.7% compared to the previous year. Anji adds: Japan is actually the second biggest market with over $8.1 billion in total spending in 2012, and it might reach $11 billion in 2015. Mobile is really hot in Japan, with $1.8 billion spent in 2012, ranking as the second biggest market for mobile advertising expenditures, just behind the US. Although Japanese people are known to open their wallets for digital contents such as mobile apps, games, and newsletters, it turns out that they are not especially keen to click on ads. On the web, it’s interesting to note that almost 40% of Japanese never click on sponsored ads on search engines, and only 6% of those who do have bought…
Photo: Simon le nippon on Flickr
For western companies, entering the Asian market is no easy task. There is the inevitable language barrier, not to mention the cultural differences. We had a chance to talk to Anji Ismail, the CEO of online marketing platform DOZ, in order to hear his thoughts on what makes the Japanese market especially different.
For starters, online marketing in Japan is very well-developed. According to a study by Dentsu published in March of this year, online marketing budgets in Japan grew by 107.7% compared to the previous year. Anji adds:
Japan is actually the second biggest market with over $8.1 billion in total spending in 2012, and it might reach $11 billion in 2015. Mobile is really hot in Japan, with $1.8 billion spent in 2012, ranking as the second biggest market for mobile advertising expenditures, just behind the US.
Although Japanese people are known to open their wallets for digital contents such as mobile apps, games, and newsletters, it turns out that they are not especially keen to click on ads.
On the web, it’s interesting to note that almost 40% of Japanese never click on sponsored ads on search engines, and only 6% of those who do have bought something after clicking. Actually, Japan has one of the lowest click-through rates, with only a 1.4% click rate on web ads. However, budgets are growing for search engine and social media optimization.
While Japanese people do click on ads, the CTR remains low. A relevant survey by Goo Research shows that almost 63% of respondents have clicked on ads shown on search results, while 24% have not. When asked what type of ads they are more likely to click, the most popular response was banner, images, or Flash at roughly 46%, and text ads on search results ranked second at about 28%. Links within newsletters, affiliate links within contents, and links within blog posts (content-match advertising) followed at around 25%.
Of course, entering the Japanese market cannot and should not be just restricted to online marketing. It’s a mixture of offline and online tactics, and some US companies have done it very well. Evernote is one good example. The company marked its third year anniversary in Japan back in March. There are over five million users in Japan and it’s the second most active market after US in terms of active users, with 30% of its revenue coming from the country.
Evernote was a typical case of what is called ‘blogger marketing’ in Japan. They reached out to tech savvy and influential people online, people who acted as ambassadors for the service. Lots of meetups were held, and these ambassadors also helped Evernote with promotion in book and other publications. Searching for ‘Evernote’ on Amazon Japan now yields over 500 results.
Google is another company that many Japanese people find appealing. In a survey about popular online brands, Google ranked third after Rakuten and Yahoo. That score is calculated from important factors such as usability, number of visits, and website loyalty. But the company’s unique promotions have likely been a factor in its popularity. For Google+, the company collaborated with the all-girl idol group AKB 48 and fashionista/pop star Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. To promote its Chrome web browser, the company aired a TV commercial featuring the popular virtual diva Hatsune Miku.
Of course these are just a few cases, and there are many others. And given the money to be made in this lucrative market (especially on mobile), marketing to Japanese consumers will continue to be a challenge — but one with a big payoff for those who do it right.
Junya Mori
See the original story in Japanese.
Yukari Mitsuhashi
Rick Martin
Masaru Ikeda
