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Top 50 Digital Media Startup Investors in Japan in April 2025

Last updated: Apr 2025 A list of 50 angel investors and VC (Venture Capital) funds that invest in Digital media startups based in Japan. We rank investors based on the number of investments they made in Digital media companies from Japan. We update this investor list every month.

Top 50 Digital Media Startup Investors in Japan in April 2025

Investor	Digital Media Japan investments
Seiko Electric	2
Vector	2
S.T. Corporation	1
North Pacific Bank	1
Japan Finance Corporation	1
Regional Revitalization Solution	1
Quantum Leaps Ventures	1
Hankyu Hanshin	1
Nissay Capital	1
Gree	1
KDDI Open Innovation Fund	1
AG Capital	1
QTnet	1
Global Brain Corporation	1
B Dash Ventures	1
Chishima Real Estate	1
SBI Investment	1
Money Forward Venture Partners	1
SG INCUBATE	1
Shizuoka Capital	1
W ventures	1
SMBC Venture Capital	1
One Capital	1
Mitsubishi UFJ Capital	1
Sazaby League	1
Makers Fund	1
Canon Marketing Japan MIRAI Fund	1
Toranomon Impact Capital	1
Takeshi Aoki Yamato	1
Seiichiro Wada	1
DFR Asia	1
Goshi Yamaguchi	1
Wavemaker Partners	1
SEPTENI HOLDINGS Japan	1
FFG Venture Business Partners	1
FGN ABBA Lab	1
Takeshi Natsuno	1
Sagin Capital & Consulting	1
YoStar	1
Incubate Fund	1
Kiyohiro Sugashita	1
NetAge	1
Richard Lo	1
JIG-SAW	1
Shinichi Misawa	1
ANRI	1
Kiyoshi Nishikawa	1
Regional Economy Revitalization Support Organization	1
ThirdwaveSolutions	1
Isetan Mitsukoshi Innovations	1

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Investor list

Seiko Electric has contributed to society with the best products and services. They have continued to develop technologies that usher in new eras based on sound management and human resource development. They will work to develop new products and businesses using original information and control technology and contribute to the construction ofenvironmentally friendly, safe, and comfortable social infrastructure.

Investment focus

Photography, Digital Media, Artificial Intelligence
Seed, Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

HMS — HMS develops AI smart camera that integrates image input and processing.

Vector is a Japan-based PR agency that provides PR planning and implementation services for its clients. The agency also offers other services covering areas such as management, finance, accounting, human resources, administration, internal controls, and audits. Vector was founded in 1993.

Investment focus

Software, Marketing, Media and Entertainment
Funding Round, Seed, Corporate Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

bythen — bythen enables the production of autonomous 3D avatar bots powered by AI.
Wewill — Wewill is a consulting company that provides accounting, SaaS, business development, and business consulting services.
Aplaca.Lab — Aplaca.Lab is a driver substitution platform that provides an unprecedented new driving experience. They released a driving agency application for providing comfortable driving experiences. It enables driving agencies to optimize their resources and clients' safety, prevent accidents, and receive assistance in areas with limited transportationoptions.

S.T. Company is a maker of deodorizers and air fresheners, mothproofing chemicals, gloves, dehumidifiers, and other items. Their products include soap, grapefruit, aroma chamomile, charcoal and sandalwood, air freshener, moth proofer, dehumidifier, gloves, green bouquets, cleaner, and other items.

Investment focus

Video, Animation, Digital Media
Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Forest Digital — Forest Digital is a media company that provides video, presentation, animation, and VR production services.

North Pacific Bank provides various banking products and services for individuals and corporations in Japan. It offers deposits, and negotiable certificates of deposit, as well as loans. North Pacific Bank also offers ATM, foreign exchange, and investment trust services. It operates 171 branches and 3 overseas representative offices. HokuyoSogo Bank that began operation in 1917 became North Pacific Bank in 1989. It has its headquarters in 1917, with its headquarters in Sapporo in Japan.

Investment focus

Manufacturing, Financial Services, Human Resources
Seed, Funding Round, Corporate Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Forest Digital — Forest Digital is a media company that provides video, presentation, animation, and VR production services.
Mechano Cross — Mechano Cross is a mechanical company that offers mechanochemical organic synthesis technology for solution reactions.
Interstellar Technologies — Interstellar Technologies is a rocket development, manufacturing and launch service.

Japan Finance provides a diversified portfolio of financial services to the small and medium enterprise sector.

Investment focus

Software, Information Technology, Internet
Debt Financing, Funding Round, Seed
Japan, Hong Kong

Portfolio highlights

Rakubil — Rakubil is a software development firm that develops applications and platforms for the commercial real estate sectors.
Tryeting — TRYETING provides an AI platform that integrates various types of software. One of the strengths of the company is materials informatics, a field that applies the techniques of informatics, such as AI and big data, to materials. This approach can significantly speed the development of new materials.
Forest Digital — Forest Digital is a media company that provides video, presentation, animation, and VR production services.

Regional Revitalization Solution is a tourism industry fund.

Investment focus

Location Based Services, Travel, Career Planning
Seed, Corporate Round, Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Chipee — Chipee is a social networking platform that enables its users to send digital gratitude in the form of chips.
Otetsutabi — Otetsutabi is a regional revitalization platform that offers the opportunity for participants to help at accommodations and breweries in rural areas that struggle with seasonal labor shortages. The locals offer transportation expenses and places to stay in return, so participants can travel to the areas with ease.
COUNTERWORKS — Counter works is an Information technology company.

Quantum Leaps Ventures establish and invest in internet and technology companies.

Investment focus

Consulting, Health Care, Artificial Intelligence
Seed, Pre-Seed, Series A
Japan, Malaysia

Portfolio highlights

Agatyca — Agatyca is an IT company that develops customized solutions to optimize payment system processes for organizations.
CareMaker — CareMaker is a technology company that develops and operates visit schedule management and regional collaboration cloud services.
Umee Technologies — Umee Technologies is an IT firm that offers full-stack development, conversational AI, and psychological analysis engine services.

Hankyu Hanshin operates in the urban transportation, real estate, entertainment and communications, travel, international transportation, and hotels businesses in Japan and internationally. It provides various urban transportation services linking railways, buses, and taxis; and advertising services. Hankyu Hanshin is also involved in theretailing business; development, lease, and administration of condominiums, commercial facilities, and office buildings; real estate fund management; and communication and media businesses, such as information services business, and broadcast and communications business. Moreover, it engages in the sports businesses, including professional baseball, Hanshin Koshien stadium, and related businesses; and stage businesses comprising Takarazuka Revue and related businesses. Further, Hankyu Hanshin is involved in the provision of travel and international transportation services, as well as ownership and management of hotels. It operated 46 hotels with 10,000 rooms as of March 31, 2018. Hankyu Hanshin began operation in 1907. It has its headquarters in Osaka in Japan.

Investment focus

Internet, Web Apps, Cryptocurrency
Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

DeCurret — DeCurret is into Cryptocurrency Business.
Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.

Nissay Capital is a venture capital Company specializing in seed, start-up, growth capital, middle stage, and later stage investment.

Investment focus

Health Care, Internet, Medical
Funding Round, Seed, Series A
Japan, United States, Ethiopia

Portfolio highlights

AirX — AirX is a management service company specializing in air transportation agency business and travel arrangement business. The company leverages technology to transform the notion of mobility into an unprecedented experience. It also provides services such as CodeShare, AIROS Skyview, and AIROS Air Loss. AirX will create the movement of the futuresociety, sightseeing and the way of life of helicopter, Empty MaaS, Flying taxi, eVTOL, and Next-generation traffic.AirX was established on February 23, 2015, and is based in Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, Japan.
HQ — HQ offers next-generation employee benefits platform.
Doctor's Prime — Doctor's Prime is a technology company that provides is a part-time job information service for optimizing the working style of doctors.

Gree is a Japanese internet media company that provides mobile social networking, and mobile technology services for its users. Gree shares development and operational expertise across all its studios as Gree always works to create new game models for its customers.

Investment focus

Mobile, Gaming, Internet
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
Japan, United States, Singapore

Portfolio highlights

Oasys — The Dedicated Gaming Blockchain. Oasys is an eco-friendly blockchain built for the gaming community, offering the best user experience with fast transactions and zero gas fees.
Oasys — The Dedicated Gaming Blockchain. Oasys is an eco-friendly blockchain built for the gaming community, offering the best user experience with fast transactions and zero gas fees.
Bankers Holding — Bankers Holding controls the bankers group companies that provide financial services via internet.

KDDI Open Innovation Fund is a corporate venture capital fund that will support promising startup companies. Total size of the fund is JPY10 billion. This is the first corporate venture capital fund established by KDDI. The fund will be managed by Global Brain Corporation (Head office: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President and CEO, Yasuhiko Yurimoto),which has a strong track record in the venture capital business. By combining KDDI’s know-how and assets with Global Brain’s investment and management support capabilities, we will work together to accelerate cooperative activities with promising startup companies. Through this fund, as well as "KDDI ∞ Labo," a startup incubation program currently inviting a second round of applications, we will continue to support the growth of the next startup companies.

Investment focus

Software, Mobile, Internet
Funding Round, Series B, Series A
Japan, United States, Germany

Portfolio highlights

MOSH Japan — MOSH is a web page creation services for individual business owners.
Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.
Turing — Turing develops and manufactures fully autonomous vehicles.

AG Capital is an investment firm that provides investment and property management solutions for middle-size businesses. The company was founded on December 12, 1985 and its headquarters are located in Minato-ku, Tokyo.

Investment focus

Finance, Software, Internet
Series A, Seed, Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Chipee — Chipee is a social networking platform that enables its users to send digital gratitude in the form of chips.
Torana — Torana provides "Toysub!" well known as educational toy subscription service in Japan market. We plan to go global and will be more bigger market share holder in East Asia. We collect month-age base toy feedback data and children's development status information. We plan best combination of toys and deliver. Customer returns and getsnew toys which fit children's growth and it is eco friendly service. We plan to build our own brand toys based on massive customer feedback and growth data and enter D2C market.
BitStar — BitStar accelerates potential of video creators with power of proprietary database and technology.

QTnet is a telecommunication and internet service provider.

Investment focus

Artificial Intelligence, Medical, Software
Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

HMS — HMS develops AI smart camera that integrates image input and processing.
Medmain — To create a world where medical services can be accessed with technology anywhere,anytime-As a supporting partner to medical practitioners throughout the world, Medmain develops and operates PidPort, an analytical system for pathological image diagnosis that makes use of Deep Learning, as well as Medteria, a specialized cloud-based service for medical students.

Global Brain Corporation is a venture capital firm that invests in companies from seed or early to pre-IPO startups. Global Brain has invested in 300+ startups from seed/early to pre-IPO startups and achieved 25 IPOs and 61 M&As as a result of providing hands-on support services and resources to its portfolio startups. Global Brain hasmanaged a pure investment fund as well as multiple corporate venture capital funds partnered together with tier 1 public companies of telecom, real estate development, financial service, beverages, agriculture food, logistics, and electronic devices.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Software, Artificial Intelligence
Series A, Series B, Funding Round
Japan, United States, United Kingdom

Portfolio highlights

Cellid — Cellid developing the waveguide-architecture display module for AR glasses and high-performance spatial recognition software.
Tokenz — Tokenz is your all-in-one platform for global digital payments, cross-border tax compliance, and seamless payouts.
Boston Medical Sciences — Boston Medical Sciences conducts research, prevention, and diagnostics procedures to eliminate colorectal cancer deaths.

B Dash Ventures does seed to late stage tech investments in Japan, Asia Pacific, and the U.S. LPs include Japan's largest technology companies and financial institutions including NTT Docomo, Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, GREE, NEC BIGLOBE, Fuji Television, and the Japanese government. B Dash Ventures also operates an incubation space inpartnership with Mori Building Co. and holds the invitation-based B Dash Camp conference.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Internet, Media and Entertainment
Seed, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, Taiwan, United States

Portfolio highlights

Newmo — newmo delivers sustainable local public transportation create a user experience (UX) that people may utilize with peace of mind and comfort.
Yosemite — Yosemite is a wellness company that provides health and wellness products, supplements, skincare, and personal care items.
Qlay — Qlay is an AI-automated global engineer hiring platform

Chishima Real Estate engages in a range of business including real estate, aircraft leasing, and regional revitalization activities.

Investment focus

Sales, Medical, Parking
Funding Round, Series D
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Akippa — Akippa is a Osaka based parking space reservation app company.
Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.
Kringle Pharma — Kringle Pharma, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company, develops pharmaceutical products based on its research on hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) and NK4. Its HGF has the regenerative healing ability in regard to liver cells, as well as various cells and organs; and NK4 is a bi-functional molecule, which inhibits the invasion and metastasis of tumorcells as an HGF-antagonist, as well as possesses antiangiogenic activity. The company’s pipeline includes recombinant human HGF for the treatment of acute renal failure, skin ulcers, and CNS diseases; and recombinant human NK4 and NK4 gene drugs for cancer therapy. Kringle Pharma, Inc. was founded in 2001 and is based in Toyonaka, Japan.

SBI Investment supports the business development and growth of private venture companies through fund investment. It manages and manages venture capital funds under the management philosophy of becoming a leading company responsible for the creation and development of core industries in the 21st century as a "new industry creator".SBIInvestment has invested in a total of 986 companies in the past, of which 169 (17.1% of investment companies) have exited through IPO or M & A.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Software, Financial Services
Series B, Series A, Funding Round
Japan, South Korea, United States

Portfolio highlights

Zolve — Best neo bank in India offering international banking & financial services online. Apply for a US bank account, credit card & student education loan with Zolve!
Zerodoor HD — Zerodoor HD specializes in digital transformation in constructing industry.
TOKYO GameFi — TOKYO GameFi is a Web3 firm formed by a management team of developers and engineers with previous experience at CyberAgent.

Money Forward Venture Partners operates HIRAC FUND, a seed fund specializing in seed and early-stage startups.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Wellness, Software
Seed, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, United States

Portfolio highlights

SALOWIN — SALOWIN is a shared salon where freelance hairdressers can freely provide customer service and service.
Find — Find is a software company that provides cloud development and operation services.
Crowd Chem — Crowd Chem is an IT company that specializes in software development, data services, and consulting services.

SG Incubation was born as an investment company for the formation of corporate venture capital (CVC), which invests in Kyushu's first startup company.Regardless of the stage of growth, the startup company that will be the investor will first value the “human nature” of the manager, determine whether it is a company that should support thefuture, and provide capital and management back up. The Seibu Gas Group will continue to aim for new business areas.

Investment focus

Software, Logistics, Information Technology
Series A, Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

HMS — HMS develops AI smart camera that integrates image input and processing.
YeLL — YeLL is a company that help transform the organization by making the real sound of employees visible.
Metaverse Creators — Metaverse Creators is a feature-rich virtual platform providing gamers with a wide range of games, creation tools, and avatar editing tools.

Shizuoka Capital Company Limited operates as a venture capital firm. It engages in the acquisition, holding, and, sale of securities.

Investment focus

Software, Information Technology, Content
Funding Round, Series A, Series B
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Gaudi Clinical — Gaudi Clinical is a health care firm that engages in regenerative medicine outsourcing and cell processing contract establishments.
Umee Technologies — Umee Technologies is an IT firm that offers full-stack development, conversational AI, and psychological analysis engine services.
Takumi Giken Kogyo — Takumi Giken Kogyo is a price technology developer to help parts manufacturers quickly identify acceptable product prices. Takumi Giken Kogyo assists in estimate calculation and product function through AI drawing search and repeat project determination function, enabling manufacturers with flexible customization of product functions based oncustomer requirements.

W Ventures is a Berlin based Venture Design and Venture Capital company that offers a complete framework for the acceleration of digital business ideas.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Content, E-Commerce
Seed, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, Indonesia, United States

Portfolio highlights

Newmo — newmo delivers sustainable local public transportation create a user experience (UX) that people may utilize with peace of mind and comfort.
Tradom — Tradom is a company that offers the "Tradam Foreign Exchange Solution," an AI solution for managing foreign exchange risk.
Starley — Starley offers end-to-end development and implementation of artificial intelligence-related products.

Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) and its group companies offer a broad range of financial services centered on banking. They are also engaged in the leasing, securities, credit card, investment, mortgage securitization, venture capital and other credit related businesses. The following lists the activities of SMBC, its subsidiaries andaffiliates in the various business segments.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Health Care, Software
Funding Round, Series B, Series A
Japan, United States, Singapore

Portfolio highlights

Ababa — Ababa provides recruitment and employment solutions.
SALOWIN — SALOWIN is a shared salon where freelance hairdressers can freely provide customer service and service.
Penetrator — Penetrator transforms the real estate market with space technology, tackling transaction issues and forming landslide observation systems.

One Capital is an investment firm.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Software, Sales
Seed, Series A, Series B
Japan, Finland

Portfolio highlights

PeopleX — PeopleX encourages and assists employees in their professional development.
Digireha — Digireha is an IT company that provides a tool for rehabilitation by combining digital art and sensors.
H2 Corporation — H2 Corporation offers an automation solution called "AI Estimation" for estimating tasks.

Mitsubishi UFJ Capital is a venture capital firm focusing on life science, ICT, and high technology investments.

Investment focus

Information Technology, Software, Health Care
Funding Round, Series A, Series B
Japan, United States, China

Portfolio highlights

Ababa — Ababa provides recruitment and employment solutions.
Emium — Emium creates an infrastructure that will be a driving force in dental care and dental technology.
RegCell — RegCell aims to generate novel therapeutic technologies through augmenting or controlling the immune system and our goal is to save patients who suffer from autoimmune diseases and cancer .

Sazaby League is an online store that sells clothing, apparel goods, beauty accessories, household goods, food and restaurant products.

Investment focus

Fashion, Shopping, Recycling
Series A, Series B, Funding Round
Japan, Germany

Portfolio highlights

Comvey — Comvey provides a shopping experience that is friendly to people and the earth. It primarily offers a foldable share bag online.
AI model — AI model specializes in the development and transformation of real-like virtual models for modeling on E-commerce platforms.
Formo — We're Formo, the future of dairy. Using micro fermentation, we create animal-free cheeses that humans love.

Makers Fund is a global interactive entertainment venture capital firm focused on early stage investments. The team supports founders through an extensive network and deep experience in the industry.

Investment focus

Gaming, Video Games, Online Games
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, United Kingdom, Finland

Portfolio highlights

Hybe IM — HYBE INTERACTIVE MEDIA (HYBE IM) is broadening the scope of HYBE's entertainment offerings by creating games and publishing them for people all over the world. HYBE IM creates numerous contents and services by combining cutting-edge interactive media technology with music, artists, and entertainment components, resulting in new viewpoints andexperiences.
Rune — Rune is an automated friend or squad finder and voice chat for players on mobile games. Users can hang out and share amazing experiences together. The company builds the future of LFG for mobile gamers.
Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.

The information about the Canon Marketing Japan MIRAI Fund.

Investment focus

Speech Recognition, Information Technology, Artificial Intelligence
Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

RABO — RABO is a Cat-Tech Company that "watches cat life with technology.
Aeronext — Aeronext is a Japanese startup that provides a center of gravity control technology to enhance the basic performance of drone.
Smart Education — Smart Education, Ltd. (located in Tokyo, Japan, President Daigo Ikeya) launched it’s kid’s music app “Rhythm Book” for smartphones and tablets. It’s in the App Store as an universal app for iPhone, iPad and iTouch. With Rhythm book, kids can learn and feel the rhythm by tapping instruments along with their favorite songs. There are more than 100kid’s songs from TV, cartoons, to choose from and nursery rhymes in English and in Japanese. Stimulate the young mind with genuine and real studio recorded music and sounds. This app is designed to co-play between parents and child. You can purchase more songs via internet and the songs you’ve purchased can be co-owned by the same Apple ID through iCloud.

Toranomon Impact Capital provides impact investment in health sector.

Investment focus

EdTech, Training
Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Chipee — Chipee is a social networking platform that enables its users to send digital gratitude in the form of chips.
MELON — MELON creates mindfulness programs using a scientific methodology and provides them in a specialized studio.

Takeshi Aoki Yamato is the Representative Director of Capital Medica Ventures.

Investment focus

Social Media, Digital Media, Social Network
Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Chipee — Chipee is a social networking platform that enables its users to send digital gratitude in the form of chips.

Seiichiro Wada - Director @ Monex Ventures

Investment focus

Agriculture, Legal, Content
Seed, Series B, Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Chipee — Chipee is a social networking platform that enables its users to send digital gratitude in the form of chips.
AGRI SMILE — AGRI SMILE is a platform that focuses on sharing agricultural technology.
CharacterBank — CharacterBank offers game development and production services using VR technology.

DFR is a digital media venture studio. DFR conceives, builds, and assumes ownership and execution responsibility for new ventures from inception. DFR is the first company in the world to deploy the emerging studio model in Asia, and the first venture studio dedicated exclusively to digital media.

Investment focus

Video, Digital Media, Media and Entertainment
Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Breaker — Breaker is Japan's global digital studio.

Goshi Yamaguchi

Investment focus

Food and Beverage, Digital Media, Apps
Seed, Pre-Seed, Corporate Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

ReadHub — ReadHub is a Information technology , Planning, development and management of Internet media and applications company.
Pan For You — Pan For You is a Food & Beverage Company. We deliver delicious bread from all over the world with our unique freezing technology and propose a lifestyle where you can enjoy freshly baked bread anytime.
ZAZA — ZAZA is focus to make the world where people can respect each other even thought they have a different culture and belief.

Wavemaker Group is a cross-border venture capital firm founded in 2003 and one of the most active early-stage investors across multiple funds.

Investment focus

Software, E-Commerce, Information Technology
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, Singapore, Philippines

Portfolio highlights

Pi-xcels — Eco-friendly NFC digital receipts solution for actionable shopper data and enhanced customer journeys. No App, Just Tap. With one-tap convenience, Pi-xcels unlocks omni-channel marketing opportunities and boosts performance for retailers with our customer intelligence platform.
Oneteam — We acquire small to medium businesses and help next-gen hardworking employees grow into capable owners of these businesses. Using digital-first solutions to drive growth, synergies and innovation, we collaborate with your employees to transform your business into global enterprises.
Soul Parking — Soul Parking is a parking management service company, which has successfully developed motorcycle storage equipment as a solution for traffic and parking problems that are cluttered using 100% designs and raw materials. Soul Parking provides solutions by developing a modern, safe and comfortable vehicle parking system that takes into accountlimited land area.

Septeni Holdings started as a recruitment consulting company and become an internet advertising company in the year 2000. The company was established in October 1990 and is based in Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, Japan.

Investment focus

Internet, Content, Marketing
Series A, Funding Round, Corporate Round
Japan, United States

Portfolio highlights

Sproot — Sproot engages in the media and entertainment business.
Gokko Club — Gokko Club operates in the digital entertainment industry, focusing on content creation, public relations, and video production. The company is known for its short drama productions, which are characterized by their condensed content and fast-paced development. Gokko Club handles all aspects of these productions in-house, including scriptwriting,directing, production, and editing. The company also has a strong presence on social media platforms like TikTok, where it has amassed a significant following. In addition to its entertainment offerings, Gokko Club also provides music streaming services.
Brave group — Brave group engages in IP development, marketing and support services.

FFG Venture Business Partners is a large-scale enterprise that offers in traditional regional bank venture capital.

Investment focus

Software, Health Care, Information Technology
Funding Round, Series A, Seed
Japan, United States

Portfolio highlights

ACCEL Stars — ACCEL Stars is a fitness and wellness firm that offers sleep diagnosis and examinations like sleep health, hygiene and medical devices.
KOALA Tech — Koala Tech Inc. is an innovative high-tech startup company, whose goal is to pioneer practical applications of the world's first organic semiconductor laser diode that has been realized in the Center for Organic Photonics and Electronics Research (OPERA) at Kyushu University.
Neusignal Therapeutics — Neusignal Therapeutics is a medical company that develops therapeutic medicines for dementia and psychiatric illnesses.

FGN ABBA Lab is an investment fund that mainly supports pre-seed to series A early stage startups. In this FGN ABBA Lab fund, they will support startups with the idea of creating “things and things” that make the world exciting without limiting the genre, investment, training, and social implementation.

Investment focus

Software, Aerospace, Information Technology
Seed, Pre-Seed, Funding Round
Japan, Hong Kong

Portfolio highlights

neuet — neuet develops and operates a smartphone application that offers bike-sharing services.
HMS — HMS develops AI smart camera that integrates image input and processing.
Sorano Me — Sorano Me is a content creation and media company that provides space related content, space data and consulting services.

Mr. Takeshi Natsuno serves as the Chairman of Japan Operations at Great Wall Club. Mr. Natsuno is a Professor of KEIO University. He served as a General Manager of Consumer Services Division and Manager of Distribution Platform Business Development Division at Pia Corporation since April 2012 and served as its Chief of Sales Promotion Bureau sinceApril 2010. He joined DoCoMo in 1997. He served as the Managing Director of Multimedia Services, Products & Services Division for NTT DoCoMo Inc. until June 23, 2009 and served as its General Manager of i-Mode Planning Division since July 2001, Senior Vice President from June 21, 2005 to June 23, 2009, Executive Officer and General Manager Multimedia Service Division since June 2005. At NTT DoCoMo, he developed the business strategy of all of NTT DoCoMo’s multimedia-related services, including i-mode strategic alliances with global application/content providers and key Internet players. He served as Vice President of Hyper Net Co., Ltd. since June 1996. He started his career with Tokyo Gas. He held key executive positions with HyperNet. He has been a Director of Dwango Co. Ltd., since December 1, 2008. He has been a Outside Director at Sega Sammy Holdings Inc. since June 2008. He has been a Director at Pia Corporation since April 2010. He serves as a Director of D.L.E Co. Ltd. He has been a Director of Gree, Inc. since September 2009 and Trans Cosmos, Inc. since 2008. He serves as a Director of GREE Ventures, Inc. He serves as a Member of Advisory Board at Great Wall Club. He served as an Independent Non-Executive Director of SBI Holdings Inc. from June 27, 2008 to June 28, 2012. He served as a Director of Hyper Net Co., Ltd. since June 1996. He is the Author of i-mode Strategy, published in 2000, a la i-mode, published in 2002, Keitai-no-Mirai, published in 2006, Iccho-yen kaseida otokono shigotojutu, and Google ni izonshi Amazon wo maneru bakakigyou published in 2009. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Economics from Waseda University, Japan in 1988 and an Master’s Degree in Business Administration from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1995.

Investment focus

Financial Services, Music, Venture Capital
Angel, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, United States

Portfolio highlights

ZUU — ZUU is a Japan-based company that supports financial advisors with related consultancies and manages monetary websites. It also supports the asset management and asset advisor business of executives with finance and IT.
Zuu Online — ZUU online is a Tokyo-based financial media which provides original insights on financial market news,the latest business trend and personal finance advice
Confidence — Confidence ensures that the entertainment industry's cutting-edge manufacturers will be able to fulfil their objectives in the future.

Sagin Capital & Consulting is the venture capital arm of The Bank of Saga.

Investment focus

Internet, Artificial Intelligence, Information Technology
Funding Round, Series A, Seed
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Yuime — Yuime is an HR consulting firm that offers agricultural staffing, contract farming, and recruitment services.
Precal — Precal is an information technology company that develops applications that are common with pharmacies, pharmacists, and dispensing clerks.
Live Search — Live Search provides the real estate industry with online room availability management, property photography, and floor plan services.

YoStar is an application that facilitates the adjustment of a telescope towards a space object.

Investment focus

Portfolio highlights

Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.

Incubate Fund is an independent early-stage venture capital that specializes in providing capital to technology startups at the seed stage. The firm built a portfolio of over 300 companies in Asia, taking 12 companies to public and 20 companies to M&A exit since 2010.

Investment focus

Software, Information Technology, E-Commerce
Seed, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, United States, India

Portfolio highlights

Kaguoku — Kaguoku develops and provides the AI-based home staging services. It offers a service that uses AI to process interior photos of real estate properties to increase the property's ability to attract customers.
Time Prediction — Time Prediction focuses on development of diagnostic pharmaceuticals, drugs and medical devices for the treatment of neurological diseases.
Mjolnir Spaceworks — Mjolnir Spaceworks desings and manufactures state-of-the-art novel space rockets with efficient engines as well as other space equipments.

Mr. Sugashita joined Polaris as Advisor in May 2011. He is Director and CEO of Sugashita Partners, Ltd since 1998 and provides consulting services to financial institutions and ventures in and outside of Japan. Prior to that position, he was CEO of Lazard Japan Asset Management from 1991 to 1998. His business career also includes positions at DaiwaSecurities and Merrill Lynch Securities, Tokyo Branch. On the academic front, Mr. Sugashita received a BA in Economics from Ritsumeikan University and since 2009 is Special Advisor for the Dean of Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University.

Investment focus

Marketing, Travel, Media and Entertainment
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

G-Next — G NEXT is an Information Technology based company.
Fun — Fun is a sightseeing entertainment company that makes the world even more of a fun place.
Tabinaka — Tabinaka is a Japanese booking & reservation platform for overseas tours and travel activities.

netage, inc. is a venture capital firm specializing in startup and incubation investments. They invests in internet business. netage is located in Tokyo, Japan.

Investment focus

News, Local, Big Data
Pre-Seed, Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

JX Press — The JX PRESS Corporation is Japan’s“virtual news agency.”JX PRESS’s “FASTALERT” service provides breaking news bulletins for urgent information on accidents, natural disasters, and other incidents detected by AI to all six of the major television broadcast stations in Japan, including NHK, and the majority of the 100+ local broadcast stations.FASTALERT works with more companies than any other service that utilizes information gathered from social networking sites for news reporting in Japan.The version offered to ordinary consumers, an app called “NewsDigest,” is the biggest news bulletin app in Japan, boasting over 1 million downloads. It is gaining popularity because of its ability to use AI to automatically detect and deliver news bulletins on information worth reporting. Alongside FASTALERT, it is also gaining more widespread use by news reporters as a standardized service for information.Stakeholders in the JX PRESS Corporation include KYODO NEWS, the leading news agency in Japan, two of the leading commercial broadcast stations (TV Asahi and Fuji TV), and the Nikkei Group. We are a new kind of news agency that provides computerized news reporting to all of the major media groups in Japan.Bloomberg - This Media Startup Is Beating the Competition With a Newsroom Run by Robots https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-27/the-airline-geek-trying-to-build-a-media-giant-with-no-reporters
Oceans — Oceans Inc. was incorporated on September 16th, 2010 as an internet service company with the expressed goal of making the Internet more useful, more local, more here and now. Specialists from the fields of user interface, user experience, creative, programming and monetization gathered to make this possible. Currently, these development and serviceoperations professionals operate Eyeland(http://eyeland.in), a popular local communications platform.

Richard Lau serves as Head of Wealth and Personal Banking Risk at Hang Seng Bank.

Investment focus

Content, Marketing, Digital Media
Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

DoubleL — Doublel is a general trading company of pop culture that develops Japanese manga, anime, and games internationally. The company was founded in 2014 and based in Tokyo, Japan.

JIG-SAW (San Jose) offers neqto, an all-in-one solution for IoT. As an all-in-one, fully managed solution for IoT, neqto provides: hardware, embedded and edge software, communication mechanisms, and cloud. Through neqto, easy and secure bidirectional communication for transmitting, collecting, and controlling things and systems via IoT is madepossible.With their core competencies in monitoring services, cloud technologies, mobile communication modules, embedded systems, and IoT equipment they hope to support and accelerate the automation and decentralization of the next generation of technology companies.

Investment focus

Content, Marketing, Digital Media
Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

DoubleL — Doublel is a general trading company of pop culture that develops Japanese manga, anime, and games internationally. The company was founded in 2014 and based in Tokyo, Japan.

Shinichi Misawa - Director @ Zappallas

Investment focus

Content, Marketing, Digital Media
Series A, Funding Round
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Kudan — Kudan has been providing proprietary Artificial Perception technologies based on SLAM to enable use cases with significant market potential and impact on our lives such as autonomous driving, robotics, AR/VR and smart cities
DoubleL — Doublel is a general trading company of pop culture that develops Japanese manga, anime, and games internationally. The company was founded in 2014 and based in Tokyo, Japan.

ANRI is a Japanese venture capital firm that mainly invests in seed and early-stage startups.

Investment focus

Software, Health Care, Information Technology
Seed, Funding Round, Series A
Japan, United States, India

Portfolio highlights

AirX — AirX is a management service company specializing in air transportation agency business and travel arrangement business. The company leverages technology to transform the notion of mobility into an unprecedented experience. It also provides services such as CodeShare, AIROS Skyview, and AIROS Air Loss. AirX will create the movement of the futuresociety, sightseeing and the way of life of helicopter, Empty MaaS, Flying taxi, eVTOL, and Next-generation traffic.AirX was established on February 23, 2015, and is based in Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, Japan.
Pleap — Pleap is a medical engineering company specializing in the development of AI and IoT-based technology solutions tailored for medical institutions. The company's product offerings include "medimo" which is an AI tool that automatically creates medical record manuscripts from medical audio.
Ryulog — Ryulog is a recruiting company that helps job seekers find international work opportunities and migrate abroad.

After working at KDD Corporation ï¼ˆCurrently known as KDDI Corporationï¼‰, Kiyoshi Nishikawa next went to work at Arthur D. Little Inc. in the United States, where he became inspired to start his own company. After returning to Japan, he established a Japanese corporation of the worldâ€™s largest Internet company, America On Line, LLC. Later andbased on this experience and the relationships he developed, he founded the first Internet business incubator, NETAGE, Inc. After serving as the President and CEO of NETAGE Group, he later became and still serves as the Chairman of ngi group, inc. Kiyoshi was one of the main entrepreneurs responsible for proposing and realization of â€œShibuya Bit Valley Conceptâ€ and is well known for his various speeches and writings. He is a graduate of the Department of Education at Tokyo University.

Investment focus

News, Social Media, Big Data
Seed, Funding Round, Pre-Seed
Japan, United States

Portfolio highlights

PoliPoli — PoliPoli is a next-generation politics co-creation platform where you can participate like a game. Politicians from all over Japan post their policies in an easy-to-understand manner, and those who sympathize can enjoy working on the "missions" necessary to realize the policies.
Astroscale — Astroscale is the first private company with a vision to secure the safe and sustainable development of space for the benefit of future generations, and the only company solely dedicated to on-orbit servicing across all orbits.
TECHFUND — TechFund is a venture capital firm specializing in incubation and seed stage investments. The company is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.

The Regional Economy Revitalization Support Organization supports small and medium-sized companies.

Investment focus

Photography, Digital Media, Artificial Intelligence
Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

HMS — HMS develops AI smart camera that integrates image input and processing.

ThirdwaveSolutions is a network, system integration, outsourcing and information equipment selling company.

Investment focus

Art, Video, UX Design
Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

Thinkr — THINKR provides advertising, video production, content, UX design, and animation services.

Isetan mitsukoshi innovations is a corporate venture capital of the Isetan Mitsukoshi Group,a retail business group centered on the department store business.

Investment focus

Delivery, Logistics, Advertising
Funding Round, Series A
Japan

Portfolio highlights

AI model — AI model specializes in the development and transformation of real-like virtual models for modeling on E-commerce platforms.
SKY FARM — Sky Farm is a platform for restaurants' and shops' ordering systems. They provide an ordering system to make delivery, takeout, and table orders.
GAUSS Japan — GAUSS develops a platform that manages the development, introduction, and operation processes of AI and machine learning.

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