『Disrupting Japan』のカバーアート

Disrupting Japan

Disrupting Japan

著者： Tim Romero
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 Disrupting Japan gives you candid, in-depth insights from the startup founders, VCs, and leaders who are reshaping Japan.Tim Romero マネジメント・リーダーシップ リーダーシップ 政治・政府 旅行記・解説 社会科学 経済学
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  • How to start an AI Startup in late 2025

    How to start an AI Startup in late 2025
    2025/09/01
    Last month I gave lecture at Globis University on what it takes to build an AI startup today. It's no longer early days for AI, and most founders don't have the connections and resources that drive toady's multi-billion dollar seed rounds. However, as I detail, they still have several paths to success. After the lecture I am joined on stage for a panel discussion by Reiji Yamanaka, the managing director of the Kibo Impact Investment Fund, and Kelvin Song, the program director of the Globis MBA program. It's a fascinating discussion, and I think you'll enjoy it. Leave a comment Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan, straight talk from Japan's most innovative founders and VCs. I'm Tim Romero, and thanks for joining me. I have a special in-between episode for you today. A few weeks back at Globis University, I gave a lecture to aspiring founders on the best way to start a generative AI startup right now in this time of intense AI competition and funding levels. I cover the different AI business models, promising application spaces, and how to know if you've got an AI startup idea with a good chance of success. Now, the first 30 minutes of this episode is the lecture itself, and then I'm joined on stage by Reiji Yamanaka, the managing director of the Kibo Impact Investment Fund, and Kelvin Song, the program director of the Globis MBA program. And we dive even deeper into these ideas and also talk about how generative AI is likely to affect us all. I hope you enjoy it. So let's get right to the presentation. Presentation Today we're going to talk about how to build a generative AI startup and some important things to keep in mind if you actually decide to do that. Now, before I tell you what we're going to cover, I want to kind of tell you what we are explicitly not going to cover. So first, we're not going to talk about the transformative nature of AI in general, the explosive growth of the market. There's already way too much chatter about that, and I assume if you're even thinking about starting an AI startup, you already know it. Second, I'm not going to offer general advice about starting and growing a startups, although this is a topic that's very close to my heart. I want to focus on what can add the most value to you in this particular seminar. If you want to talk about general start advice, talk to me later. I'll point you in the right direction or ask questions afterwards or during the panel discussion. We'll begin today by talking about four common exit and growth strategies. This is a bit unusual. I don't normally recommend that seed or pre-seed companies focus too much on exit strategy, but these are not normal times. With generative AI, you need to plan your end game from the very beginning. We'll spend the bulk of our time talking about actually building your AI startup. We'll cover some key strategic considerations, and also talk about a few of the most promising targets for AI disruption. Does that sound good? Well, before we get to it, why should you listen to me? And that's a totally reasonable question. So, I've been in Japan for, wow, over 30 years now. Currently a partner at Jira Ventures. It's $300 million corporate venture capital firm that invests in green energy, next generation energy, generation technologies. But in my time here, I've started four of my own startups I've sold two, bankrupted two. So, 50 50, not too bad as far as startups go. I've done a lot of angel investing. I've taught entrepreneurship and corporate innovation at New York University's, Tokyo Campus. I've brought foreign startups into Japan as a country manager. I was tapped by TEPCO to come in and help them spin up TEPCO Ventures. I left TEPCO to run Google for Startups, Japan, swearing I would never go back to energy CVC. After four years at Google, I decided to go back to energy CVC because right now what's happening in energy is just fantastically exciting. Oh,
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    1 時間 16 分
  • Japanese technology to supercharge human fertility

    Japanese technology to supercharge human fertility
    2025/08/18
    Japan's declining birth rate makes global headlines, but most of the developed world will soon be facing the same problem. The real solution involves a lot of social and economic changes, but as you'll see, technology has a huge role to play as well. Today we sit down and talk with Kaz Kishida, CEO of Dioseve, about how their technology promises to transform IVF, the rapid timeline for global rollout, and safety issues and ethnical questions involved. It's a great conversation, and I think you'll enjoy it. Show Notes How Dioseve will make IVF far more successful Why over 7% of all babies born in Japan are from IVF Bio tech CEOs don’t need life science degrees Safety concerns Applications to rejuvenation and ani-aging Ethical questions around this kind of reseach Japan’s policies towards stem cell and genetic research Roadmap and go-to-market Why some babies will have three parents, and what that’s good How Dioseve's ovarian cell technology will change IVF Why Japan’s bio tech ecosystem remains under-developed It's not harder to build a bio tech startup in Japan, but it is different Links from our Guest Everything you ever wanted to know about Dioseve Friend Kaz on Facebook Leave a comment Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan, Straight Talk from Japan's most innovative founders and VCs. I'm Tim Romero and thanks for joining me. Today we're going to talk about making babies. Now, this is not something that startups or startup podcasts normally weighed into, but as you'll see in this case, it makes a lot of sense. Today we sit down with Kaz Kishida, co-founder and CEO of Dioseve. And Dioseve has developed a technique for growing mature human eggs from IPS cells. Now, this technology represents a huge step forward for IVF and for human fertility in general. Some parts of Dioseve’s technology could be in commercial use as soon as next year. Now, kaz, I dive deep into Dioseve's technology and the potential good it can do and why some future babies will have three parents. We also cover the tricky ethical and safety issues involved, and we explore exactly why that, in spite of all Japan has going for it. The biotech startup ecosystem here is still facing challenges. But, you know, Kaz, tells that story much better than I can. So, let's get right to the interview. Interview Tim: So, we're sitting here with Kaz Kishida of Dioseve who's helping to address fertility by using stem cells to create fertilizer eggs. So, thanks for sitting down with us. Kaz: Thank you very much for having me. Tim: Now I gave a very high level description of what you do in the intro, but can you explain it a little better than I can? Kaz: Okay. So, our company has technology to induce IPS cells and to another types of cells, including eggs and ovarian cells. Most of their cells are related to germ cells and reproduction. Tim: Well, this technique's not yet used in fertility treatments. But it's something in the future that holds a lot of potential. Kaz: Right, right. Currently, like In Vitro fertilization, the success rate is still remarkably low. And sometimes that vitamin journey is tough. But if we can deliver our products, say IPS cell derived ovarian cells, then the IVFs will be more accessible and the success rate will be enhanced so many women and can have their children using our technology. Tim: So why would the success rate be enhanced from using these eggs produced from stem cells as opposed to eggs harvested from the women directly? Kaz: So, in the standard protocol of In Vitro fertilization, the first step is to retrieve eggs from women. And then in many cases, those eggs are immature and immature eggs can't be fertilized with sperm. So, we can mature those immature eggs and we can make mature eggs, which can be used for fertilization. So, it directly enhance their success rate of IVF. Let me clarify that. And we have two technologies.
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    38 分
  • What’s next for climate tech startups & innovation

    What’s next for climate tech startups & innovation
    2025/08/04
    Last month I spoke on a panel about the future of climate tech. I was joined by Emi Naganuma, the founder and General Partner of Apprecia Capital and Richard Youngman, the CEO Cleantech Group, with Michael Matsumura of Scrum Ventures moderating. Right now is both a challenging and an exciting time for climate tech innovatoin. It's a fascinating discussion, and I think you'll enjoy it. Leave a comment Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan, straight talk from Japan's most innovative founders and VCs. I'm Tim Romero, and thanks for joining me. I've got another quick in-between episode for you today. It's a great conversation about deep tech startups and the future of energy. I was part of a panel discussion organized by Scrum Ventures at the Sakura Deeptech Shibuya Conference. It was moderated by Michael Matsumura of Scrum Ventures, and I was joined on stage by Emi Naganuma, the founder and general partner at Apprecia Capital, and by Richard Youngman, the CEO of the Cleantech Group. We talk about the best way to raise venture funding as a deep tech startup, how enterprises and startups can better collaborate the important gaps we see in the green tech ecosystem and the somewhat controversial future of using ammonia and hydrogen as alternative fuels. So, let's get right to the panel. Discussion Michael: Thank you much for our panelists. Maybe I'll just kick it off. Maybe you could start with Richard. Could you talk a bit about like what you're seeing globally in terms of where the dollars are flowing now? Has that changed like in the last like six months, one year from what you're seeing? From your perspective? Richard: It hasn't changed radically yet, but it made it. So, I think if you go into Q1, clearly the deals in progress and so forth, some of which may have fallen apart, but some of which happen. I don't think the community in the US judging by our conference the year before was expecting the inflation reduction act to be sort of aggressively taken apart as it was. Meaning if something was already a deal was done and it was expected to continue. And so that's obviously created a lot of back backtrack there. But geographically, I would say we're still to see that. I guess the second comment might be in our 20 years and why really we're excited to be in this part of the world more and more is because we believe that innovation under this theme is coming from everywhere and should come from everywhere and needs to come from everywhere. This is not as Silicon Valley phenomenon. Silicon Valley has a role to play but so does everywhere else. And so I think long term we're expecting to see capital allocation change quite a lot. Michael: Great. Then maybe staying on that sort of the macro theme maybe I could go to Emi obviously like on a similar topic, but in terms of like your limited partners, like the discussions you're having with your investors, like has there been a change in tone? Is it like in different sectors you guys are interested in or the partners interested in? Could you maybe touch upon a bit about that? Emi: I think from the expectations from the investors, the LPs into the fund I see that they have shifted their interest into deep tech incredibly especially university or research driven. So, really deep tech and clean tech in terms of geography as well. I think a lot of attention has been in the US but now it, we do see more attention coming into Europe. We see US VCs also emerging into Europe. Before it was series B or series C that they came into. Now, early stage, I think from seed we kind of see some US VCs coming in and trying to getting into the deals. And I also see a shift of students coming in to study in Europe, but yes. Michael: And in terms of your LPs, are they mostly Japanese or are they a mix of like global LP bases that you have? Emi: We have Japanese corporates as LPs. Michael: Thank you. Then maybe Tim, to your perspective, maybe also as JIRA,
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    31 分
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