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ReCactus reaction video app wins Infinity Venture Summit pitch competition in Taipei

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See the original article in Japanese. During Infinity Venture Summit 2018 Spring in Taipei, a semi-annual conference hosted by renowned startup-focused investment fund Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), the LaunchPad startup pitch competition was held on June 8th, where Taipei-based ReCactus won the top prize. According to Infinity Venture Partners Founder and Managing Partner Akio Tanaka, of the 300 startups that have participated in LaunchPad in the last 10 years, around 20 have reached the IPO stage, another 20 or so are at M&A, and another 20 have secured large amounts of funding, which means that 1 in 5 teams has made significant progress. A total of 14 teams, 7 from Japan and 7 from Taiwan, participated in this edition of LaunchPad. The following people served as judges. Image credit: Masaru Ikeda Joesph Chan, AppWorks Josephine Cheng, KKBOX Yvonne Chen, WI Harper Brian Hsu, Mediatek Kotaro Yamagishi, Keio Innovation Initiative Hiroto Tokusei, Google Shoga Kawada Koichiro Yoshida, CrowdWorks Yoshihiko “Max” Kinoshita, Skyland Ventures Yuzuru Honda, FreakOut Holdings Kota Chiba, Drone Fund Additionally, Taiwan’s Cinchy, one of the companies sponsoring the LaunchPad session, presented the Shure high-end headset to each of the finalists. 1st place winner: ReCactus by ReCactus (Taiwan) Prizes Amazon…

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

See the original article in Japanese.

During Infinity Venture Summit 2018 Spring in Taipei, a semi-annual conference hosted by renowned startup-focused investment fund Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), the LaunchPad startup pitch competition was held on June 8th, where Taipei-based ReCactus won the top prize.

According to Infinity Venture Partners Founder and Managing Partner Akio Tanaka, of the 300 startups that have participated in LaunchPad in the last 10 years, around 20 have reached the IPO stage, another 20 or so are at M&A, and another 20 have secured large amounts of funding, which means that 1 in 5 teams has made significant progress.

A total of 14 teams, 7 from Japan and 7 from Taiwan, participated in this edition of LaunchPad. The following people served as judges.

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

  • Joesph Chan, AppWorks
  • Josephine Cheng, KKBOX
  • Yvonne Chen, WI Harper
  • Brian Hsu, Mediatek
  • Kotaro Yamagishi, Keio Innovation Initiative
  • Hiroto Tokusei, Google
  • Shoga Kawada
  • Koichiro Yoshida, CrowdWorks
  • Yoshihiko “Max” Kinoshita, Skyland Ventures
  • Yuzuru Honda, FreakOut Holdings
  • Kota Chiba, Drone Fund

Additionally, Taiwan’s Cinchy, one of the companies sponsoring the LaunchPad session, presented the Shure high-end headset to each of the finalists.

1st place winner: ReCactus by ReCactus (Taiwan)

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

Prizes

  • Amazon Loft Tokyo Invitation Tour, Airplane Tickets for 2 (Provided by Amazon Web Services)
  • 500,000 yen voucher for Freee (Provided by Freee)
  • 360 cans of Yebisu Beer (Provided by AGS Consulting)
  • 1 night stay for 5 people at Village Izukogen (Provided by Sumitomo F Real Estate)
  • 5,000 US dollars worth of GCS Credit (Provided by GrandTech Cloud Services)

ReCactus is a social app that allows users to shoot, edit, and post their video reactions alongside online video content. When someone tries to create a video reaction without ReCactus, they have to download the original video, shoot and edit their reaction while playing it, and then re-upload the finished product to YouTube or other platforms. And then there is always the chance that the video could end up deleted due to copyright restrictions on the original video content.

ReCactus collects videos that have already cleared the copyright hurdle and users can shoot a video reaction while playing them within the app. Once shooting is finished, it is mixed and edited with the original video and automatically uploaded to YouTube and other social media platforms. After launching in October of 2017 the monthly user growth rate has reached 30%, with North and South America accounting for ⅓ of the access rate respectively, the rest accessing from Russia and Southeast Asia. It is possible to imagine monetization in the form of native advertising and paid content using video reactions. The app is available on iOS and Android.

2nd place tie: TWO (Taiwan)

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

Two is an IoT (Internet of Things) hardware device that allows users to keep track of what is going on with their garbage by simply attaching it inside the can. It can run using WiFi for one year on a battery. By accumulating and analyzing the data it is possible to improve the waste disposal cycle and to lower waste management costs required from garbage collection to the landfill disposal.

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

From August, the company will start PoC (proof of concept) with the Environmental Protection Agency responsible for waste disposal in Taipei. It is said that by 2050 approximately 80% of the world’s population will live in urban areas. With an example like Toronto, Canada where the annual garbage processing costs top $2.5 billion US, it is expected that local governments from each city in each country will step up to help try and solve such headaches.

2nd place tie: Xpression by EmbodyMe (Japan)

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

Xpression is an app that replaces users’ faces and expressions as reflected in a camera with video faces and expressions in real time. It is possible to use videos taken with an iPhone or videos that have been published on YouTube, etc., as long as the facial expressions can be made out. In addition to impersonating celebrities, users can appear in online videos in suits without ever changing out of their pajamas.

While SnapChat earns much of its revenue from AR (augmented reality) ads, EmbodyMe’s business model for Xpression seems to involve YouTubers and AR ads using the app. Also, by making the Xpression functions available as SDK (software developer kit), the company is considering third party AR app developers who can incorporate it into their own apps and services.

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4th place winner: SkyRec by SkyRec (Taiwan)

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

In 2015, SkyRec, which graduated from the 11th batch of Taipei-based startup accelerator AppWorks, initially analyzed wires using cameras installed in stores, analyzed items for sale, improved display methods, selected and removed unpopular items, and specialized in offline retail marketing and business intelligence. But, for this pitch the company proposed applying their technology to the new field of unmanned shops.

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

The company introduced an unmanned self-checkout system using facial recognition technology with a function that can recognize repeat customers even without members cards. The company says that nearly 30% of manual labor time and cost at convenience stores, G stores (gas stations with convenience stores attached), and supermarkets around the world could be reduced. After winning the Slush Asia 2016 pitch competition, the company’s business has been expanding rapidly, and nearly 200 stores are currently using SkyRec, along with 199 companies using the brand.

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5th place winner: Orii by Origami Labs (Taiwan)

Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

Orii is a wearable device designed to support communication without having to look at a screen as with smartphones or smart watches. It is troublesome to have to focus on a screen while in the middle of doing something, and even dangerous to try do so while walking. Orii is a smart ring capable of transmitting voice, when a consumer wears it on their finger and hits their finger against their ear, it is possible to hear voices by bone conduction.

It is recommended for those who are inconvenienced by AirPods or other hearing devices, which must always be worn in the ear.

It is also possible to give voice commands using Bluetooth in collaboration with Siri and Google Assistant. A crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter and Indiegogo produced good results. The company also won the Techsauce Summit Tokyo preliminary round and proceeded to its finals in Bangkok in late June.


The following is a list of the teams that participated as finalists while they didn’t place 5th or above.

  • A fortune telling service for companies by Animalogy (Japan)

Animalogy is a human resource analysis platform to analyze the skills of team members and create stronger teams within the company. Animalogy proposes a fortune telling service using four pillar astrology to make guesses about human relationships and urges companies to place the right people in the right place.

  • frm.ai by UNH3O (Taiwan)

Frm.ai is a fan relationship management tool for brands, retailers, and artists. The tool tracks interactions and engagement with fans, analyzes the user’s preferences and interests, and tells users how to follow up with which fans, what messages to send, and when to send them. The company was acquired by Botomize, a company specializing in bot analysis, in March of 2018.

  • Soico Cloud by Soico (Japan)

Soico advocates the idea of “time capsule stock options” that can solve the problems of existing stock option schemes, in particular, the problem of issuing stock options after the market capitalization increases, thus making the stock price too high. The solution is to decide the number of stock options to be offered at the point of offering since it is not possible to measure its future contribution to the company. The company has developed Soico Cloud, which can complete a series of procedures on the cloud and manage, store, execute rights, and accept contracts.

  • Bonx for Business by Bonx (Japan)

Bonx, which is a wearable transceiver that allows users to communicate hands-free via the Internet, has sold approximately 20,000 units so far and is targeted at sports fans such as snowboarders and cyclists. Bonx for Business has expanded on the original Bonx to meet corporate demand by targeting users who need to communicate with each other in remote locations such as management bases and warehouses. It is assumed that the pricing structure is based on a combination of hardware sales and software usage fees.

  • Tlunch by Mellow (Japan)

Tlunch is a platform that matches open building spaces with food trucks. The company has contracts with about 70 building owners, mainly in Tokyo and Yokohama, and so far about 350 food trucks use the platform. For food truck owners, who are often individuals, it is troublesome to negotiate with each building owner individually in order to find business spaces, and this is what Tlunch aims to alleviate. Tlunch receives 15% of sales from the food trucks as a commission, 5% of which is paid to the building owner as a fee.

  • Leber by Agree (Japan)

Leber is a doctor sharing app with a question response rate of 3 minutes or more. When users input their symptoms they will receive a message from the doctor with regards to treatment, and according to symptoms and necessity may also receive information on the nearest medical institutions and open drugstores. For individual users the company offers services for 100 yen per inquiry, and Tsukuba City Hall, along with companies in the Tsukuba area, have begun offering the services for employees, staff, and their families.

  • WeMo by WeMo (Taiwan)

WeMo is a rental sharing platform for scooters deployed in Taiwan. The merits include suppression of air pollution and reduction in parking spaces. The scooters are equipped with GPS and IoT devices, and it is also possible to acquire the user’s movement data. It is convenient to use as one-way transportation since it can be left behind, like when users need to travel late at night and the public transportation has stopped or before going out drinking. Every week the company acquires 1,000 new users, and the usage per day/per scooter is 4.3 times on average. By the end of 2018, the company plans to offer services in 3,000 cities around the world.

  • Sumaho Hoken by JustInCase (Japan)

The goal of JustInCase is to apply the idea of a sharing economy to the “P2P insurance” field. Generally, with P2P insurance, insurance premiums are paid in groups (pools) that are interested in insurance among friends or with the same risk, and the insurance money is paid out from this pool. As the first step, the company will provide “smartphone insurance” covering damage to smartphones, and the second step will be to offer “Kega Hoken” (injury insurance) covering injuries from trekking and fishing events.

  • PiSquare by PiStage (Taiwan)

CG and animation production requires rendering, and rendering takes time. PiSquare applies real-time rendering technology implemented in game engines, and the like, to CG and animation production software, reducing the rendering which conventionally took 100 minutes per frame to 0.05 minutes (3 seconds) per frame. It is expected to be used mainly in animation studios and VR/AR content makers.

Translated by Amanda Imasaka
Edited by Masaru Ikeda

From 10th Infinity Venture Summit in Kobe: Here’s 14 teams at Launchpad pitch finals

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See the original story in Japanese. This is a part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit (IVS) 2017 Spring in Kobe. During the 10th edition of Infinity Venture Summit in Kobe, a semi-annual conference hosted by renowned startup-focused investment fund Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), the LaunchPad startup pitch competition was held on June 7th, where Tokyo-based Cluster developing the VR social room app won the top prize. here’s a quick rundown of the competition finals. Judges in the finals were as follows: Syogo Kawata (Advisor, DeNA) Takuya Kitagawa (Executive Officer, Rakuten) Yoshihiko Kinoshita (General Partner, Skyland Ventures) Hironao Kunimitsu (CEO, Gumi) Koki Sato (CEO, Septeni Holdings) Tetsuya Sanada (CEO, Klab) Ken Suzuki (CEO, SmartNews) Yoshikazu Tanaka (CEO, GREE) Kotaro Chiba (Angel Investor / CEO, The Ryokan Tokyo) Akiko Naka (CEO, Wantedly) Shinichiro Hori (CEO, YJ Capital) Ken Honda (Global CEO, FreakOut Holdings) Kotaro Yamagishi (CEO, Keio Innovation Initiative) James Riney (Head & Managing Partner, 500 Startups Japan) In addition, well-known Japanese serial entrepreneur Takafumi Horie took part as a special commentator. The prizes of this competition were: Amazon Web Services activate coupon worth $3,000 for all participants, and “True wish list” for top prize winner (provided by Amazon Web…

See the original story in Japanese.

This is a part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit (IVS) 2017 Spring in Kobe.

During the 10th edition of Infinity Venture Summit in Kobe, a semi-annual conference hosted by renowned startup-focused investment fund Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), the LaunchPad startup pitch competition was held on June 7th, where Tokyo-based Cluster developing the VR social room app won the top prize.

here’s a quick rundown of the competition finals. Judges in the finals were as follows:

  • Syogo Kawata (Advisor, DeNA)
  • Takuya Kitagawa (Executive Officer, Rakuten)
  • Yoshihiko Kinoshita (General Partner, Skyland Ventures)
  • Hironao Kunimitsu (CEO, Gumi)
  • Koki Sato (CEO, Septeni Holdings)
  • Tetsuya Sanada (CEO, Klab)
  • Ken Suzuki (CEO, SmartNews)
  • Yoshikazu Tanaka (CEO, GREE)
  • Kotaro Chiba (Angel Investor / CEO, The Ryokan Tokyo)
  • Akiko Naka (CEO, Wantedly)
  • Shinichiro Hori (CEO, YJ Capital)
  • Ken Honda (Global CEO, FreakOut Holdings)
  • Kotaro Yamagishi (CEO, Keio Innovation Initiative)
  • James Riney (Head & Managing Partner, 500 Startups Japan)

In addition, well-known Japanese serial entrepreneur Takafumi Horie took part as a special commentator.

The prizes of this competition were:

  • Amazon Web Services activate coupon worth $3,000 for all participants, and “True wish list” for top prize winner (provided by Amazon Web Services)
  • One year’s worth of Yebisu Beer for top prize winner (provided by AGS Consulting)
  • Use right of Freee worth 500,000 yen for top prize winner (provided by Freee)
  • Settlement fee of PayPal worth 1 million yen (provided by PayPal)

Cluster (top prize)

Cluster CEO Naoto Kato

Cluster provides a social VR (virtual reality) service under the same name, enabling large scale event in VR space gathering many users. By sharing URL, only invited users are allowed to enter a VR room and to share the experience there. The users can view the same virtual screen as other users in the VR room. The screen can display game plays or YouTube videos, so that users can discuss or share experiences while viewing the same video contents or sports matches.

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iNAIL by BIT (2nd place)

iNAIL by BIT

iNAIL is an auto-nail art print service. The conventional nail art applying procedures at salons require the time and cost to design in handwriting by nail artists; on the other hand, this service provides smart nail art printing by the exclusive nail printer only within 15 seconds in the same method as 3D printer.

The firm plans to expand its service at hair salons, nail salons, or esthetic salons. Due to the high reputation for Japanese nail arts, the firm pursues global development eagerly as well.

Town WiFi (3rd place)

Town WiFi CEO Takehiro Ogita

Town WiFi (formerly provided with the name of WiFiShare) is a mobile app enabling smart devices to connect automatically to private and free WiFi services to reduce the data communication fee. Besides Japan, the firm provides its auto-WiFi logon service in 200 locations in the US, Korea, Taiwan, or Macau. The firm aims to monetize by the push advertising when logging on and the sales commission for charged WiFi services within the app.

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One Visa by Residence (4th place)

Residence CEO Albert Okamura

Albert Okamura born in Peru, once encountered a scene where his friend was forcibly deported to Peru due to irregularities upon acquiring his visa, and that motivated Okamura to solve the problem of visa acquisition. Since Japan’s immigration inspectors are just public employees who basically only speak Japanese and the application documents are written in Japanese, it is difficult for foreigners who cannot understand Japanese to communicate using this language.

Okamura had himself worked for Tokyo Regional Immigration Bureau, and been involved in visa-issuance work. Leveraging the experience obtained there, he developed Residence, now known as One Visa. The service displays questions that are required for terms utilized upon visa acquisition in the users’ native language, and outputs them as a form written in Japanese.

The firm aims to monetize by credit clearance service for foreigners based on the registered information and launched the open beta version on June 6th. The firm was born out from Tech Lab Paak 4th batch.

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LION Project by Hyper8 (5th place)

Hyper8 CEO Keiji Isogimi

Hyper8, also known for services such as Mespo or Tabeniiku, offers a new internet service called LION Project.

LION Project is a Uber-like service for hostess bars, allowing girls to be called up to parties after events.

The service shows the amount purchased by each user is 27,000 yen (about $240) and the repeat ratio within 30 days is 68%, with 40% month-on-month growth ratio since its launch back this February. More than 820 girls have registered the service.

See also:

Astool by Smooz

Astool CEO Yuichi Kato

Astool developed a “chain-reaction” type web browser Smooz available for iOS. Through text extraction, morpheme analysis, ranking and related term extraction for the current web page, it recommends search terms which will be required next by the user or suggests bookmarking to him / her by recognizing and reviewing reactions on social media.

Player! by Ookami

Ookami CEO Taiyo Ogata

Player! is a sports-centric social network app which provides information of ongoing status or results of live sports matches and allows users to share the excitement with other users viewing the same match in real-time.

See also:

HoloEyes

HoloEyes CEO Naoji Taniguchi

HoloEyes aims to make an information revolution in the medical field using VR. Its technology will be helpful for the medical world by sharing information of human bodies in 3DVR form. The medical VR database will be constructed through collection of CT scan data and forming 3D human body models, then accumulating such data.

If a search on the terms “male, 60s, prostate cancer” is made, 3D images of matched cases will be output and doctors can utilize them for diagnosis references of similar cases or training upon surgical operations. The team expects a business model providing VR viewers for hospitals and selling collected data, after obtaining patients’ consent, to medical colleges or pharmaceutical companies.

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APlay by NAIN

APlay by NAIN

APlay is a Bluetooth earphone having a voice assistant function capable of conveying smartphone notifications by voices. It notifies Twitter timelines or LINE messages while listening to music or telephone conversation.

Cansell

Cansell CEO Kyohei Yamashita

Cansell is a P2P (peer-to-peer) commerce platform for non-refundable accommodation reservation rights between guest users. In Cansell, exhibitor users who want to cancel reservations can sell accommodation rights for users who look for hotels.

The exhibitor users receive reselling money after deducting the commission for Cansell and can save the cancellation cost compared with paying the cancellation cost to travel agents or hotels; on the other hand, the purchaser users can make reservations in comparatively cheaper price.

See also:

Matcher

Matcher CEO Kohei Nishikawa

Matcher is an “alumni visit” matching service for Japanese job hunting activities. With the watchword “do me a favor in return for advising about job hunting?”, the service connects students who want to consult about job hunting and businesspeople who have favor to ask on the web only by one-click.

For students, there is a merit that they can easily visit employees currently working at intended companies other than graduates of the university. For companies, they can use the service as an effective method for approaching incoming employees. Matcher, launched last February, acquired 10,000 users as of this April and has been adopted by more than 100 companies.

Scouty

Scouty

Scouty is a AI-powered human resource matching service, especially focused on engineers. Monitoring engineers’ information on social media and crawling open data on the web, the service integrates personal information about 800,000 engineers. It predicts the probability of retirement utilizing AI analysis for corrected data and matches them for the best companies.

For people potentially changing jobs, Scouty offers his / her profile email based on the template.

Receptionist by Delighted

Receptionist by Delighted

Receptionist provided by Delighted is a visitor reception service available for iPad. With this app, users can handle visitors using chat tool such as Chatwork or Slack. The app can also link with schedule / customer management system or labor management platform.

When a visitor is going to be late for an appointment, he / she can easily contact the intended person in charge via the app in a single operation. At a reception desk, any meeting procedure can be automated just by waving smartphone over the Receptionist app on iPad. Delighted plans to launch the app for smartphones in the future.

Translated by Taijoro Takeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy

From Infinity Ventures Summit in Kyoto: 14 startups pitch at Launch Pad competition

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This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2015 Fall in Kyoto, Japan. See the original story in Japanese. Infinity Venture Partners, a Tokyo-based global investment fund, organized its semi-annual startup showcasing event in Kyoto earlier this month, where 14 startups exhibited their products to investors and entrepreneurs. Hokkaido-based Agri Info Design won the top prize with their mobile app solution called AgriBus-Navi. Here’s a quick rundown of the top five winners and finalists. 1st prize winner: AgriBus-NAVI (by Agri Info Design) AgriBus-NAVI is a mobile app for installation on farm machinery like tractors, crop harvesters, and self-propelled sprayers for checkrow planting. One of the utmost difficulties in farmwork is confirmation as to agrochemical spraying having  been performed properly because rough chemical spraying causes fertilizers to be wasted. This mobile app replaces conventional GPS-based systems that have been used to solve such issues. 2nd prize winner: Nutte (by State of Mind) Nutte is a crowdsourced platform of seamstresses, receiving orders for all manufacturing processes for creation of clothing, from design to sewing. Differentiating from similar Japanese services like Sitateru, Nutte allows users to order their originally designed clothing or items using an image sketch. See also: Sitateru:…

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-award-presenting

This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2015 Fall in Kyoto, Japan.

See the original story in Japanese.

Infinity Venture Partners, a Tokyo-based global investment fund, organized its semi-annual startup showcasing event in Kyoto earlier this month, where 14 startups exhibited their products to investors and entrepreneurs. Hokkaido-based Agri Info Design won the top prize with their mobile app solution called AgriBus-Navi.

Here’s a quick rundown of the top five winners and finalists.

1st prize winner: AgriBus-NAVI (by Agri Info Design)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-agribus-navi

AgriBus-NAVI is a mobile app for installation on farm machinery like tractors, crop harvesters, and self-propelled sprayers for checkrow planting.

One of the utmost difficulties in farmwork is confirmation as to agrochemical spraying having  been performed properly because rough chemical spraying causes fertilizers to be wasted. This mobile app replaces conventional GPS-based systems that have been used to solve such issues.

2nd prize winner: Nutte (by State of Mind)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-nutte

Nutte is a crowdsourced platform of seamstresses, receiving orders for all manufacturing processes for creation of clothing, from design to sewing. Differentiating from similar Japanese services like Sitateru, Nutte allows users to order their originally designed clothing or items using an image sketch.

See also:

3rd prize winner: CloudSign (by Bengo4.com)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-bengo4.com-cloudsign
Bengo4.com Taichiro Motoe

Bengo4.com, the company behind Japan’s foremost legal portal under the same name, was listed on the TSE Mothers Market in December 2014. The company recently launched an online contract signing platform called CloudSign.

Using the CloudSign platform, a sender of a contract is requested to upload an agreement form in PDF format designating which part of the form should be filled by a recipient. Then the recipient will receive an e-mail containing a unique URL to browse the form. As the recipient signs the form with a digital signature, the finalized version of the form will be shared on both sides by each other via the platform.

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4th prize winner: Anyca (by Anyca)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-anyca

Anyca is a car-sharing platform for individuals. When a user books a car registered on the platform, the owner of the car will be requested to approve the use. Upon the approval, both parties can arrange a delivery place of the car each other. The user will be requested to return the car to the owner after the use. Allowing users to apply for a car insurance by the day, the service is aimed to secure both easiness and safety. The service is a provided by a group company of DeNA (TSE:2432), a Japanese leading mobile gaming company.

5th prize winner: Repro (by Repro)

repro_featuredimage

Repro is a startup behind a mobile app analysis and marketing tool, having won pitch competitions at startup events like our Mixer Tokyo and B Dash Camp.
In addition to quantitative analysis, this tool provides mobile developers with qualitative analysis visualizing user behaviors on screen by using movies. It also allows the developers to send push notifications or in-app messages to their users.

Adopted by and implemented into 1,025 apps from 17 countries worldwide, paying mobile developers comprise 5.6% in the entire user base of the analysis platform. The company fundraised 1 million yen (about $820,000) from DG Incubation and other companies in April.

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-repro

See also:

Below are the startups selected as finalists.


Wizpra NPS (by Wizpra)

wizpra_featuredimage

Founded in March 2013, Wizpra has been providing a user experience management platform called Wizpra NPS and an employee experience management (EEM) platform called Wizpra Card. Wizpra NPS has been adopted by more than 1,000 retailers in Japan including fitness gyms in the six months since launch.

The company fundraised a total of 230 million yen (about $1.9 million) from Gree Ventures, Mobile Internet Capital, SMBC Venture Capital and Mizuho Capital in January.

See also:

LiveConnect (by Z-Works)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-z-works_liveconnect

Z-Works has developed a home gateway device, a cloud platform and mobile app leveraging sensors corresponding to the Z-wave standard, a wireless communication specification for home automation. Amongst their products, LiveConnect is an IoT (Internet of Things) service for home security.

Aiming to support care for the elderly, for instance, their smart lock solution allows caregivers to lock a room using a mobile app and a motion sensor by detecting the sign of wandering behaviors of their charges.

Medicine Delivery (by Minacolor)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-minacolor

Minacolor has been offering advice on medicines and treatments by pharmacists online. The company started an on-demand medicine delivery service in November of 2013.

Using the service, a pharmacist from the company will choose an appropriate medicine according to one’s symptom and their deliverer will bring it to the door of one’s home within the shortest delivery time of 30 minutes after receiving the order. The service is currently available in the central district of Tokyo, or the southern part of the area surrounded by Yamanote Loop Line.

Users will need to place an order using a mobile app so that it will record their order history upon considering multiple drug intake or future ordering convenience. The company takes about 5,000 yen (or about $41) on average from each order with an average profitability of 10%, aiming to crowdsource jobs to 80,000 qualified pharmacists who want to work at home.

Popcorn (by Coubic)

popcorn_featuredimage

Coubic is a startup known for a freemium scheduling and appointment booking solution under the same name. The company provides a mobile app offering special deals on last-minute bookings for beauty and massage salons, called Popcorn. Available only for booking up to 15 minutes prior to receiving, the app adopts advance payment to reduce the risk of cancellation for salon owners. These salon owners can use the Coubic platform to better manage customers.

See also:

Spectee (by Spectee)

spectee_featuredimage

Spectee shows users critical incidents and events happening now in an easier manner by curating updates from social media and sorts them based on geotags or keywords contained in every tweet or message post. About 60 locations across Japan are set in the app where users can see what is happening in real time in every location.

See also:

Fitty (by Scala International)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-fitty

Fitty is a mobile app that helps women find the proper fit for lingerie pieces. By entering several selections like bra size or body shape into the app, it will suggest users the best-fit selection of bras. In order to enable presentation of best suggestions to users, the company has been collecting up-to-date product profiles from fashion retailers and manufacturers to incorporate them into the app.

As an extension of the recommendation result, the app will give users a link so that they can purchase bra items online. The company is considering launch of a business which provides statistical data of bra wearers to lingerie manufacturers.

Partee (by g&h)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-partee

Partee is a mobile app that allows users to create a T-shirt or smartphone cases using their favorite pictures. Users can also create it using pictures uploaded by not only them but also their friends. When one’s picture is used by other users, some revenue will be shared with the owner of the picture.

Monomy (by Fun Up)

monomy_featuredimage

Monomy is an iOS app that offers an online marketplace for creatives, allowing people to make accessories they like with ease using smartphones. The platform was launched in August by Fun Up, the Tokyo-based company which has been running several online services since 2011.

The difference between trendy marketplaces for handmade goods and Monomy is that users only need to design the accessories they want. What happens is that Monomy takes care of the whole process from receiving orders through production in their own workshop. They can take large orders such as orders for 1,000 items and make them all in their workshop, with the accessories being made by experienced craftspeople by hand.

See also:

LaFabric (by LifeStyle Design)

ivs-2015-fall-kyoto-launchpad-lafabric

LaFabric is a made-to-order fashion e-commerce site. Since its launch back in February of 2014, starting with custom-made business suits and shirts, they have expanded to jeans and other casual fashion items to cover people’s needs.

LifeStyle Design, the company behind the service, fundraised about 100 million yen (or about $830,000) from Nissay Capital in May.

Translated by Moto Tsujino via Mother First
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy and Masaru Ikeda

From Infinity Ventures Summit in Kyoto: 13 startups pitch at Launch Pad competition

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This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2014 in Kyoto, Japan. See the original story in Japanese. At the Infinity Ventures Summit in Kyoto last week, 13 startups showcased their products to an audience of investors and entrepreneurs. Osaka-based Galaxy Agency, the company behind parking lot sharing platform Akippa, won the top prize. The top five winners and finalists were: 1st prize winner: Akippa (by Galaxy Agency) Akippa is an online peer-to-peer parking lot sharing platform. Launched in Osaka, the service is available all across Japan and it allows users to park their car for up to 500 yen ($4) a day. They recently launched a valet parking service at selected locations, called Akippa Plus. See also: Japan’s parking lot sharing platform Akippa secures additional funding from DeNA Japan’s Airbnb for parking spaces ‘Akippa’ fundraises from DeNA and angel investors Japan’s Akippa and Uber teamed up, proposing park-and-ride option for car owners 2nd prize winner: PopSlide (by Yoyo Holdings) PopSlide is one of the largest mobile reward platforms in Southeast Asia. The platform distributes news, weather forecasts, and other updates to your smartphone lock screen. In return for viewing such information, users receive rewards for free…

ivs-2014-fall-kyoto-launchpad-award-presenting

This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2014 in Kyoto, Japan.

See the original story in Japanese.

At the Infinity Ventures Summit in Kyoto last week, 13 startups showcased their products to an audience of investors and entrepreneurs. Osaka-based Galaxy Agency, the company behind parking lot sharing platform Akippa, won the top prize. The top five winners and finalists were:

1st prize winner: Akippa (by Galaxy Agency)

akippa_screenshots
Akippa’s mobile app

Akippa is an online peer-to-peer parking lot sharing platform. Launched in Osaka, the service is available all across Japan and it allows users to park their car for up to 500 yen ($4) a day. They recently launched a valet parking service at selected locations, called Akippa Plus.

See also:

2nd prize winner: PopSlide (by Yoyo Holdings)

popslide

PopSlide is one of the largest mobile reward platforms in Southeast Asia. The platform distributes news, weather forecasts, and other updates to your smartphone lock screen. In return for viewing such information, users receive rewards for free Internet access on their smartphone.

See also:

3rd prize winner: Farmnote

farmnote

Designed for dairy and stock farmers, Farmnote helps farmers manage livestock such as the early detection of disease and optimum breeding time for livestock. The mobile app can record livestock activity and store the data on the cloud as well as monitor a farm or a ranch.

4th prize winner: Karte (by Plaid)

karte

Karte is a real-time customer behavior analytics platform for e-commerce sites. The platform provides insight into the demographics of typical e-commerce customers visiting a site, and it automates promotion efforts in order to gain conversion rates for opportunities such as user registration or item purchases.

5th prize winner: Mamorio (by Otoshimono.com)

mamorio

Mamorio is the world’s smallest tracking tag that helps people find lost items using crowdsourced forces. The Otoshimono.com team launched a crowdfunding campaign for the tracking tag device on Japanese crowdfunding site Motion Gallery, and raised 3 million yen ($24,800) in a target bid of 1.5 million yen ($12,400).

Below are the startups selected as finalists.


Match: Battle-type study workbook app for high school students (by Baton)

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Match is an app that aims to make the studying of Japanese history fun for high school students. The app is comprised of 2,000 questions from textbooks and university entrance exams.

Smaoku: Real-time flash auction app (by Zawatt)

smaoku

Launched back in early 2013, this mobile auction app targets women in their 20s and 30s. Smaoku deals in luxury brand items, which is a key differentiator from other flea market apps and auction sites. In July, the company partnered with Mobaoku, a DeNA subsidiary behind an auction service.

See also:

Bizer: Crowdsourced back-office operation platform (by BizGround)

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Bizer lets users crowdsource documentation tasks to business consultants, such as certified tax accountants, labor consultants, notary publics, and judicial scriveners, for a flat monthly subscription fee of 2,980 yen ($30). Accountants offer their free time and provide advice to SME owners via the platform.

See also:

Flipdesk: Promotion platform for e-commerce owners (by Socket)

flipdesk

Flipdesk is an e-commerce promotion platform targeting smartphone users. With the platform, e-commerce owners can give a different promotion reward to every customer; such as distributing optimized discount coupons or promotional messages similar to face-to-face sales efforts at a real store. The service has been deployed to Tokyu Hands Net Store, an online storefront by one of Japan’s largest variety store chains.

OpenLogi: Outsourced logistics service for small/medium-sized companies and freelancers

openlogi

No Initial fee nor monthly fee needed. OpenLogi provides SMEs and freelancers with inspection at warehouse, storage in warehouse, shipping distribution, and management of returned merchandise are available for affordable rates.

Circuit: ‘Deep link’ optimization platform for mobile app developers (by Fukurou Labo)

circuit-click-count

Deep link means the link that lets users jump to a specific page on a mobile app rather than its top page. By using the Circuit platform and embedding its JavaScript tag on your website, it allows users to show them your content via your mobile app rather than a web browser if users have already installed your app into their handsets.

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Wovn.io: Adding multilingual support for websites with single script code (by Minimal Technologies)

wovn.io

Wovn.io provides multilingual support for your website or blog by adding a single JavaScript code to a website source. When you register an URL of your website on Wovn.io, the platform will cut out texts and transfer them to Microsoft’s machine translation service. Translated results can be adjusted using the Wovn.io dashboard.

Sekai Lab: Crowdsourced offshore app development service (by Sekai Lab Pte. Ltd.)

sekai-labo

Sekai Lab allows Japanese companies to crowdsource their app development tasks at affordable rates from crowdsourced engineers in China, Vietnam, and other Asian countries. The platform helps users communicate with crowdsourced engineers in Japanese, aiming to help the Japanese IT industry despite a lack of engineers.

See also:

Cerevo to set up $20M fund to accelerate Japan’s hardware startup ecosystem

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See the original story in Japanese, part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Sapporo 2014. Tokyo-based Cerevo, the Japanese startup best known for its Cerevo Cam and IoT crowdfunding site Cerevo Dash, announced today that it will invite Osamu Ogasahara to the company’s board pending approval at their board meeting on June 2nd. We had a chance to speak with the company’s co-founder and CEO Takuma Iwasa, as well as Ogasahara, at the Infinity Ventures Summit 2014 happening right now in Sapporo, Japan. Ogasahara is the co-founder of Japanese internet service provider Sakura Internet as well as owner for the popular entrepreneur hub Awabar and co-working space Nomad New’s Base [1]. The Bridge: Since it’s a complicated topic, would you like to clarify what’s happening with your company right now? Iwasa: Sure. As we published on our blog, Ogasahara will join our board pending approval at our board meeting on June 2nd. Shares of our company held by Inspire Technology Innovation Fund, Neostella Capital, Voyage Ventures, and Inova [2] will be handed over to Ogasahara. We’re also planning a big funding round as well. The Bridge: Your company has developed consumer electronics like Cerevo Cam and enterprise hardware…

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From the left: Takuma Iwasa, Osamu Ogasahara

See the original story in Japanese, part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Sapporo 2014.

Tokyo-based Cerevo, the Japanese startup best known for its Cerevo Cam and IoT crowdfunding site Cerevo Dash, announced today that it will invite Osamu Ogasahara to the company’s board pending approval at their board meeting on June 2nd.

We had a chance to speak with the company’s co-founder and CEO Takuma Iwasa, as well as Ogasahara, at the Infinity Ventures Summit 2014 happening right now in Sapporo, Japan. Ogasahara is the co-founder of Japanese internet service provider Sakura Internet as well as owner for the popular entrepreneur hub Awabar and co-working space Nomad New’s Base [1].

The Bridge: Since it’s a complicated topic, would you like to clarify what’s happening with your company right now?

Iwasa: Sure. As we published on our blog, Ogasahara will join our board pending approval at our board meeting on June 2nd. Shares of our company held by Inspire Technology Innovation Fund, Neostella Capital, Voyage Ventures, and Inova [2] will be handed over to Ogasahara. We’re also planning a big funding round as well.

The Bridge: Your company has developed consumer electronics like Cerevo Cam and enterprise hardware like LiveShell. How does the funding and the change of the board member influence your plans?

Iwasa: First, we’ll step up marketing of our brand and accelerate global expansion. Second, we’ll have an incubation project focused on hardware startups.

The Bridge: Your business heavily depends on international sales, right?

Iwasa: Yes, some of our products receive over 40% of all orders from overseas. We will try to raise this to 80%. We also plan to expand our range of products, especially in the IoT and ‘high amateur’ spaces.

The Bridge: What do you mean when you say ‘high amateur’ space?

Iwasa: It’s difficult to explain since it’s a relatively new concept. It means a series of products ranging in a space where professional and hobbyist use overlap. Our video and still camera products are categorized there.

I know the market can grow explosively where low-end products for professional use and high-end products for hobbyist use intersect. That’s what I mean by ‘high amateur’ space. It’s not a huge market because it targets a niche. Successful examples in this area include DJI’s Phantom 2 and GoPro.

The Bridge: Your company is a 10-person team but we heard you’re planning to enlarge it to about four times that.

Iwasa: We’re planning to increase our head count up to 50. Our strategy is to target niche markets and produce a variety of products. […] We think our business is scalable as long as we have a sufficient number of talented people. We are hiring engineers in many fields like electrical engineering, design, mechatronics, app development, and infrastructure.

The Bridge: Let’s talk about the incubation project. Regarding the IoT fund you are planning, who will be in charge of forming this? We heard that Cerevo got money from an investment fund. Is that correct?

Ogasahara: I am the general partner of the fund. We’ll be forming a fund worth $20 million this coming summer, and will invest in Cerevo from that. It’s sort of like a growth fund that I was eager to raise money from when I founded my internet service provider company many years ago.

The Bridge: So you will invest not only in Cerevo but also in other hardware startups. You also have another investment initiative at ABBALab, where you have specifically invested in startups which have succeeded in raising money on crowdfunding sites. How are the funds different?

Ogasahara: For that initiative, we’ll keep seeking young entrepreneurs and help them create prototypes and launch their businesses in a hands-on manner. People are unlikely to create hardware products as easily as they would create smartphone apps. ABBALabs aims to remove the financial or environmental obstacles for ambitious entrepreneurs.

The Bridige: So what does Cerevo expect by launching this incubation business?

Iwasa: Our main focus is to help crowdfunding efforts in Japan and the rest of the world, and to help crowdfunding project owners manufacture their products. We’ll set up a garage and shared office in Akihabara, and we are also planning to organize hardware-focused workshops and hackathon events too.

Ogasahara: By giving knowledge of mass production to entrepreneurs who already succeeded in creating their products, we really want to eliminate barriers for them. I believe it can really help a lot of people.

Iwasa: Looking at posts on bulletin boards, you can see that many entrepreneurs succeed in raising money on Kickstarter, but many of them run into difficulties in mass production. But the biggest obstacle for them will come after production. We help them sell, we support them, and we encourage them to develop the next model of their product. This is where our experience can help.

Ogasahara: We’re running a site called DMM.make in partnership with The Bridge, as you know. This is also part of our effort to encourage businesses to create hardware products. We want to provide opportunities where people can learn, make, share, sell, and buy what they create.

Iwasa: So if you’re interested in this space but don’t know what to do, don’t hesitate to come and join us.

The Bridge: Thanks for your time.


  1. Disclosure: The Bridge has a business partnership with Nomad, the company that Ogasahara has managed. We are providing selected articles to DMM.make, a news curation site by Japanese internet company DMM. 
  2. Inova is a fund focused on investing in electronics manufacturing startups and was formed by three Japanese companies: Thine Electronics (TSE:6169), Chip One Stop (TSE:3343), and Ant Capital Partners.

Lancers CEO Yosuke Akiyoshi on obstacles facing crowdsourcing in Japan

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This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013 See the original article in Japanese We conducted many interviews about consumer-to-consumer (C2C) businesses at the recent Infinity Ventures Summit. Today we have a conversation from that event that we had with Yosuke Akiyoshi, the CEO of Lancers, a leading startup in Japan’s crowdsourcing space. The Bridge: Here I’ve been interviewing many people from the C2C businesses. One of the hot topics among those people lately is Crowdworks’ recent fund raising. Akiyoshi: Looking back on the five years since we launched our crowdsourcing business, the space has really changed a lot. We target people with basic knowledge of the internet, and among those people, words such as ‘crowdsourcing’ and ‘Lancers’ became better known. It took four years for the total number of users (workers who receive orders) to reach 100,000. The number rapidly grew to 200,000 this October, and 220,000 last month. It could surpass 300,000 early next year. But some users still feel they don’t fully understand the system. So, we need to better educate them. In that sense, the 1.1 billion yen (raised by Crowdworks) means a lot in developing the industry. The Bridge: You announced…

This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013

See the original article in Japanese

We conducted many interviews about consumer-to-consumer (C2C) businesses at the recent Infinity Ventures Summit. Today we have a conversation from that event that we had with Yosuke Akiyoshi, the CEO of Lancers, a leading startup in Japan’s crowdsourcing space.

The Bridge: Here I’ve been interviewing many people from the C2C businesses. One of the hot topics among those people lately is Crowdworks’ recent fund raising.

Akiyoshi: Looking back on the five years since we launched our crowdsourcing business, the space has really changed a lot. We target people with basic knowledge of the internet, and among those people, words such as ‘crowdsourcing’ and ‘Lancers’ became better known. It took four years for the total number of users (workers who receive orders) to reach 100,000. The number rapidly grew to 200,000 this October, and 220,000 last month. It could surpass 300,000 early next year. But some users still feel they don’t fully understand the system. So, we need to better educate them. In that sense, the 1.1 billion yen (raised by Crowdworks) means a lot in developing the industry.

The Bridge: You announced today that Lancers will have partnership with GMO Epsilon Inc.

Akiyoshi: GMO Epsilon offers payment services, and lots of work opportunities will arise due to the implementation of the service. Many of such work orders will be placed on Lancers.

The Bridge: The fast-growing aspects of crowdsourcing tend to get a lot of attention. But many services struggle to build a solid culture for C2C and B2C businesses. What kind of issues do you face?

Akiyoshi: Users are increasing, and I don’t see any problem with that. The problem lies on the side of the companies. Currently, there are a core group of companies who are accustomed to the system. But the goal is for any company to use the system. And there are issues that need to be overcome.

The Bridge: I see.

Akiyoshi: First, direction. When a company places an order, it needs to divide the work. But many companies get stuck at this point.

The Bridge: For example, for a web-design work order, work needs to be divided into coding, writing, and programming, with an order made for each. We plan to solve this issue by holding seminars for companies and dividing up the process control of the system. Also, product managers who can understand and handle the process are needed. We aim to implement more training to increase the amount of such product mangers. We need to enlighten companies.

The Bridge: When you enlighten companies, so to speak, which advantages of Lancers do you emphasize?

Akiyoshi: We tell them the overall advantages in speed, cost and resources.

The Bridge: What about users who receive orders? How do you educate them? I heard you often visit local areas.

Akiyoshi: I have already visited about 15 regions. I realized it is important to have face-to-face communication and to solve such issues. There are few jobs in local regions. Businesses in Tokyo take jobs from the local. There are few useful communities where you can find opportunities, unlike Tokyo.

The Bridge: How long do you think it will take for crowdsourcing to be accepted as a new kind of work style?

Akiyoshi: It depends on how we measure the success, although we have set a metric. Right now, there are about 200 workers who can make a living just from their Lancers work. We’d like to increase that figure to 10,000 by 2017. But it will take much longer to completely change people’s way of working.

The Bridge: It will certainly take a while. So what number or metric do you currently care about the most?

Akiyoshi: Focusing on improving the users’ experiences, we pay attention to the repeat customer rate. Of course we look at the number of the work orders and the member total at the same time.

The Bridge: Thank you for your time.


I got the impression that more workers understand the concept of crowdsourcing these days. But there are still lots of obstacles that get in the way of companies using crowdsourcing. It’s not only about speed and cost, but quality needs to be considered. And it requires more understanding from companies about how to use the system and handle the process control. That knowledge is not open enough, and it becomes an obstacle.

Japanese classifieds site Jmty.jp looks for light at the end of the tunnel

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This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013 See the original story in Japanese. One of the trending sectors on the Japanese internet these days is the C2C (consumer to consumer) market. This includes small-sized e-commerce platforms, flea market apps, and crowdsourcing platforms too. But in Japan, the market is not easy to grow without significant effort. In contrast with the US, many C2C players in Japan may be poorly perceived in the eyes of Japanese users, where consumers are more likely to buy from a publicly recognized company. At the venue of Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto, we saw many of the key players in the C2C sector. I had a chance to speak with Takahiro Kato, the CEO of Jmty.jp (pronounced as Jimoty). The company provides local classifieds and forums for local communities, including listings for jobs and second-hand items. The company was launched back in 2011 and raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), and additional funding of 150 million yen (about $1.5 million) from KDDI, Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, and IVP back in 2012. It also raised money from Fuji Startup Ventures last August. The story so…

takahiro-kato_at-ivs

This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013

See the original story in Japanese.

One of the trending sectors on the Japanese internet these days is the C2C (consumer to consumer) market. This includes small-sized e-commerce platforms, flea market apps, and crowdsourcing platforms too. But in Japan, the market is not easy to grow without significant effort. In contrast with the US, many C2C players in Japan may be poorly perceived in the eyes of Japanese users, where consumers are more likely to buy from a publicly recognized company.

At the venue of Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto, we saw many of the key players in the C2C sector. I had a chance to speak with Takahiro Kato, the CEO of Jmty.jp (pronounced as Jimoty). The company provides local classifieds and forums for local communities, including listings for jobs and second-hand items.

The company was launched back in 2011 and raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Infinity Venture Partners (IVP), and additional funding of 150 million yen (about $1.5 million) from KDDI, Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, and IVP back in 2012. It also raised money from Fuji Startup Ventures last August.

The story so far

The Bridge: What has happened with Jmty in the last three years?

Kato: We surpassed 1.4 million monthly visitors and 11 million monthly page views back in November. And we surpassed 1 million monthly visitors back in September.

The Bridge: So you mean your users have been rapidly increasing in the last few months?

Kato: Our service was recently featured on Mezamashi TV, a popular morning TV show. I know typically most TV appearances give only a momentary boost but not a sustained increase. However this recent feature brought us many long-standing active users.

The Bridge: Is there any improvement in user activity?

Kato: 20% or 30% of the items presented on our website are unwanted articles that users want to give away for free. When you post a message about this kind of item, you will usually get a comment from other users within 24 hours.

The Bridge: Craigslist is a very similar business to yours. Do you know how large their business is in the US?

Kato: It is said that they still have 60 million monthly visitors with 2 billion monthly page views. That’s really huge.

C2C is different in Japan

A classified platform needs to diversify its business to scale. And I thought acquiring 1.4 monthly visitors in three years was not such a big number. I asked him further about the potential of opportunities in the Japanese C2C market.

The Bridge: Compared to Craigslist, your business is still quite small. Is your growth slower than you expected?

Kato: Craiglist needed five years to surpass 10 million monthly visitors. I know several similar cases in China too. So this speed of growth is within our expectations.

The Bridge: Do you want to see a steeper increase? I think completely open C2C platforms face many obstacles in the Japanese market. For example, many users expect the operators of these platforms to assure the quality of the items they will buy on the platform.

Kato: It’s a fact that we get inquiries from some users asking how we will be responsible for a possible defective purchase. That’s why we added a notice all across our website that we will take no responsibility for any possible defects from trades between users.

The Bridge: So you need to educate users more?

Kato: By adding many notices, it encourages users to police themselves in a way. If you set up a hotline to receiving reports of defective items, many users will kindly tell us who the offending users are.

jmty_screenshot

The platform was launched by Hirofumi Ono, the co-founder partner of Infinity Venture Partners. I asked him where in Jmty’s business he might find some potential to scale up.

The Bridge: When you launched Jmty.jp back in 2011, there was a big rise in classified platforms in mainland China. 58.com (NYSE:WUBA) had recently IPOed. Did these happenings have any impact on your decision to launch?

Ono: When we launched it, we thought it had lots of potential. We saw China’s 58.com and Baixing.com were rapidly growing. We actually asked Baixing.com about the key is to their success.

The Bridge: Did you get some useful advice from them?

Ono: They say it takes a long time to grow. Many C2C services in China have been running since 2005. We were also aware that we divided our topics into too many segments. Jmty.jp has many segments by region as well as by category, and that was intended to result in more accurate message postings.

But a classifieds site has to give users a simple way to interact since all users are not always so savvy. We believe that our service requires simplicity rather than pursuing an experience where topics are focused on special/niche purposes.

The light ahead

There is still a the long way to go in terms of growth for Jmty. And at the end of the interview, I asked Kato how they might emerge from this seemingly endless tunnel.

The Bridge: Will you keep making efforts to increas content topics?

Kato: We will continue to focus on diversifying content that may better suit our users. Regarding posts about jobs or second-hand items, these can be curated a minimal effort.

The Bridge: Can you share any figure on how many trades and transactions you’re facilitating?

Kato: A six-digit number has been already posted, and we’re receiving about 700 new posts every day.

The Bridge: Your service targets average people, so you will need to promote it using mass media, right?

Kato: We received investments from Fuji Startup Ventures, the investment arm of Fuji TV. So we’re planning to do something using television.

The Bridge: I know you will need a long time to achieve your goal, but how do you plan to sustain your business long term? Is there any funding plan?

Kato: We are a six-person team, and currently looking for the next funding opportunity. We hope to get funding from a business entity, rather than a pure investment firm, and partner with them to grow our business together.

The Bridge: Thank you for the time and your great insights!


The key to succeed with a service like this likely depends on how they can increase number the user-generated submissions. We’ll keep our eyes on their progress, so stay with us!

Japanese mobile captcha startup Capy wins IVS Launchpad, has more plans ahead

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This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013 Last week I had a chance to catch up with the folks from Capy in an office they’re working out of in Shibuya. The founder of the up-and-coming Japanese startup and CEO Mitsuo Okada first developed the concept behind his secure captcha service while studying at Kyoto University. Capy’s value proposition, for those unfamiliar with it, is that it’s less frustrating than the twisted letter solution of convention captchas, replacing it with a sort of sliding image puzzle that robots cannot complete (see below). While talking with Okada and his colleagues last week, I happened to mention that I’d be attending the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto. “Oh, we’ll be there too,” said Okada. Skip to a week later where Okada pitched his captcha technology in front of a packed hall at the Westin Hotel Kyoto. They were one of 12 startups that took to the stage, but Capy was judged to be the best of them all. We first interviewed Okada about Capy way back in August, so they aren’t a newcomer to us. But among Japanese startups, the company does stand out in that…

This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013

Last week I had a chance to catch up with the folks from Capy in an office they’re working out of in Shibuya. The founder of the up-and-coming Japanese startup and CEO Mitsuo Okada first developed the concept behind his secure captcha service while studying at Kyoto University. Capy’s value proposition, for those unfamiliar with it, is that it’s less frustrating than the twisted letter solution of convention captchas, replacing it with a sort of sliding image puzzle that robots cannot complete (see below).

capy-demo-2

While talking with Okada and his colleagues last week, I happened to mention that I’d be attending the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto.

“Oh, we’ll be there too,” said Okada.

Skip to a week later where Okada pitched his captcha technology in front of a packed hall at the Westin Hotel Kyoto. They were one of 12 startups that took to the stage, but Capy was judged to be the best of them all.

We first interviewed Okada about Capy way back in August, so they aren’t a newcomer to us. But among Japanese startups, the company does stand out in that it has taken a pretty global approach from the very beginning, initially launching the business in the US [1].

Even though conventional captchas can be frustrating, I’ve always admired the elegance of reCAPTCHA which makes us of user input not as a security precaution, but also as a means of digitizing books. Two birds with one stone. But Capy will be able to do something similar as well, and I think that’s why it has such great potential.

capy-awards
Okada-san all smiles on stage after winning IVS Launchpad

Websites that use Capy can repurpose its validation screen as a space to advertise, and that’s especially useful given how precious space is on a typical smartphone screen. Capy will have free and premium versions, the free version being ad-supported, and with the premium version, a publisher can use whatever image they want. Right now, the company is focusing on developing the premium version. In addition to advertising, there are other purposes for which Capy images could be used. They’re hoping to attend SxSW next year, and so I expect that many of the things they are currently working on should be ready for showtime by then.

Okada tells me that currently Capy is providing 50,000 captchas per day across three or four clients here in Japan. This is the perfect test market he says, because Japan is very closed. They still have improvements they want to make in user interface and experience, but I’m told they still need more engineers. Currently they are still just a team of four with only two engineers.

Their mentor and angel investor is security expert William Saito, with series A funding last May. I expect that a lot more eyes will be on Capy after their win at IVS Launchpad. So look forward to hearing more from them in the next year or so.

capy-aws

capy-microsoft

capy-freee


  1. Capy is incorporated in Delaware.  ↩

How can Yahoo Japan fend off emerging e-commerce challengers?

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This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013 See the original story in Japanese. The Japanese e-commerce market has a volume of $83 billion, but that accounts for only 10% of the country’s entire retail market [1]. Users in Japan have shifted to browsing on mobile, and that’s where the Japanese e-commerce industry will move as well. On day one of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013, we heard from Yahoo Japan’s Takao Ozawa, whose title within the Internet giant is the head of ‘shopping company’. He shared some thoughts about how e-commerce companies can give users ways to discover new things to buy [2]. E-commerce giant Rakuten is said to be have over 100 million items on its platform, which helps you understand how important discovery and recommendation technologies will be for the e-commerce industry in the future. This session was moderated by Hirofumi Ono, of Infinity Ventures Partners. In a response to his queston about how e-commerce platforms should communicate or suggest possible purchases to customers, Ozawa noted that there are three keys: curation, search, and recommendation. He elaborated: Yahoo (Japan) is a search technology company. We’re actually using Google’s engine though. When you try…

takao-ozawa_at-ivs-2013-fall-kyoto

This is part of our coverage of Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013

See the original story in Japanese.

The Japanese e-commerce market has a volume of $83 billion, but that accounts for only 10% of the country’s entire retail market [1]. Users in Japan have shifted to browsing on mobile, and that’s where the Japanese e-commerce industry will move as well.

On day one of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013, we heard from Yahoo Japan’s Takao Ozawa, whose title within the Internet giant is the head of ‘shopping company’. He shared some thoughts about how e-commerce companies can give users ways to discover new things to buy [2]. E-commerce giant Rakuten is said to be have over 100 million items on its platform, which helps you understand how important discovery and recommendation technologies will be for the e-commerce industry in the future.

This session was moderated by Hirofumi Ono, of Infinity Ventures Partners. In a response to his queston about how e-commerce platforms should communicate or suggest possible purchases to customers, Ozawa noted that there are three keys: curation, search, and recommendation. He elaborated:

Yahoo (Japan) is a search technology company. We’re actually using Google’s engine though. When you try to find something with a keyword like ‘TV’ on our platform, it gives you back few relevant results. This was fortunately fixed. Compared to other recommendation platforms, we have more capability to assess what pages or sites our users have browsed, and which ones can give them more relevant recommendations. We all know Amazon is very good at recommendation. But Yahoo Japan might provide better results since it has such an enormous number of active users in this country.

Yahoo News is also optimizing its interface for mobile browsing, and that may represent another chance to drive traffic to the e-commerce channel by inserting recommendations between articles. Our readers may recall news curation app Gunosy found success inserting ads between news headlines or articles.

Speaking to the recent trend of emerging ‘instant’ e-commerce platforms such as Stores.jp and Base, he encouraged retailers using these platforms to use Yahoo Shopping too, and that prompted a big laugh from the audience.

I think what Stores.jp and Base are providing are functions. I expect to give retailers ways to automate setting up a shop on Yahoo Shopping when they do that on both Stores.jp and Base. We’re a media platform, which is better at acquiring users. I think the combination of function and media will make for the best business results.

I’m skeptical if Yahoo Japan is serious about partnering with the emerging e-commerce platforms, but it is interesting to see how the platforms will generate a strong lead for their merchants.


  1. According to the Japanese ministry of economy, trade, and industry.
  2. A serial entrepreneur who launched a second-hand book and video marketplace EasySeek, established a professional baseball team at Rakuten, and invested in many emerging startups like Star Festival, Nanapi, and Tokyo Otaku Mode. He sold his social marketing agency Crocos to Yahoo Japan back in August of 2012, and joined YJ Capital (the investment arm of Yahoo Japan) to help cultivate its investment and e-commerce businesses.

Japanese fashion commerce site Muse&Co passes $1M in monthly sales

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See the original story in Japanese. This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013 On day one of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto, I had a chance to speak with Hirotake Kubo, the CEO of Japanese fashion flash-sale commerce site Muse&Co. The startup was launched back in 2012, and raised 350 million yen (approximately $3.4 million) from several Japanese investment companies including Infinity Venture Partners back in May. According to Kubo, their monthly sales are now almost double what they were a half year ago, and have reached 100 million yen ($1 million). The Bridge: Your company has grown rapidly in the last half year. What happened? Kubo: We were only providing flash sale services, but it might not have been interesting enough for users. So we added curated content about fashion, and this helped us improve our conversion rate among our users. The Bridge: Adding curated content is not such a unique strategy to build a userbase. What was the key? Kubo: A list of items recommended by other users will not have such a great impact. So we used celebrities and asked them to recommend their favorite items on our site….

hirotake-kubo_at-ivs-2013-kyoto

See the original story in Japanese.

This is part of our coverage of the Infinity Ventures Summit Kyoto 2013

On day one of the Infinity Ventures Summit 2013 in Kyoto, I had a chance to speak with Hirotake Kubo, the CEO of Japanese fashion flash-sale commerce site Muse&Co. The startup was launched back in 2012, and raised 350 million yen (approximately $3.4 million) from several Japanese investment companies including Infinity Venture Partners back in May.

According to Kubo, their monthly sales are now almost double what they were a half year ago, and have reached 100 million yen ($1 million).

The Bridge: Your company has grown rapidly in the last half year. What happened?

Kubo: We were only providing flash sale services, but it might not have been interesting enough for users. So we added curated content about fashion, and this helped us improve our conversion rate among our users.

The Bridge: Adding curated content is not such a unique strategy to build a userbase. What was the key?

Kubo: A list of items recommended by other users will not have such a great impact. So we used celebrities and asked them to recommend their favorite items on our site. But consumers are very smart and will only buy items if they are good. So we carefully choose people who recommend good items, and we’re not so much focused on selling our products through that effort.

museco_screenshot

The Bridge: This kind of editorial operation is expensive I’m sure. How are your finances doing?

Kubo: I think they’re reasonable. Our editorial flow is not complete. We’re outsourcing the work, and managing it at all times with consideration of how to get better results for our money.

The Bridge: Can you share any specific growth figures?

Kubo: Our userbase keeps growing 15% every month. We have 30,000 monthly downloads of our mobile app and 40,000 new visitors on desktop. The growth rate more than doubled that of half a year ago.

The Bridge: What about the number of brands on site, and the number of users?

Kubo: We’re serving almost 1,000 brands to 400,000 users right now.

The Bridge: How much more sales you can expect to see?

Kubo: Our competitors are making around 5 billion yen ($50 million). So we can probably reach 400 million yen ($4 million) on a monthly basis.

The Bridge: Any idea on how to achieve that milestone?

Kubo: I have something in my mind, but I can’t disclose it. One thing I can share is that we’re looking to get our service out of the flash commerce business. Flash commerce helps us trigger potential customers, but we need to keep providing them with trending items at all times.

The Bridge: Thanks for talking with us!


Fashion magazine-style curated content can go a long way to helping users find things they like where a simple text search will not work. So I believe some media entities will launch e-commerce platforms in the near future, which may give consumers better accessibility to a wide variety of eye-catching items.