Explo­ring Japan with the Nor­dic Inno­va­tion House Tokyo dele­ga­tion

Ear­lier this month, I had the inc­re­dible oppor­tu­ni­ty to tra­vel to Japan as part of the Nor­dic Star­tup Eco­sys­tem Dele­ga­tion hos­ted by Nor­dic Inno­va­tion House Tokyo, repre­sen­ting Oulu along with other cities, star­tups and inves­tors from the Nor­dics. Over the cour­se of five days, we visi­ted Osa­ka and Tokyo, par­tici­pa­ted in major events like EXPO 2025 Osa­ka and Sus­Hi Tech Tokyo, and con­nec­ted with key players across Japan’s star­tup eco­sys­tem.

Day 1: Soft Lan­ding Insights in Osa­ka

We kic­ked off the trip in Osa­ka at the Osa­ka Inno­va­tion Hub (OIH), whe­re we lear­ned about their soft-lan­ding pro­gram for inter­na­tio­nal star­tups. With a network of over 1,500 players and 450 part­ners, OIH offers a robust launch­pad for newco­mers. Pro­grams like Osa­ka Spring­board and IBPC Osa­ka pro­vi­de legal advice, mar­ket matc­hing, and even free office space for up to six months, which is a valuable sup­port sys­tem for star­tups ente­ring Japan.

We also heard from Encog­nize on the essen­tials of expan­ding to Japan, inclu­ding the impor­tance of patience, rela­tions­hip-buil­ding, and alig­ning your go-to-mar­ket stra­te­gy to local expec­ta­tions. One great example of this is SaaS busi­ness models being scarce­ly popu­lar among Japa­ne­se clients com­pa­red to the wes­tern mar­kets.

After the ses­sions, my col­lea­gue Taka­ko Uchi­da and I visi­ted the Osa­ka World Expo 2025 site, especial­ly the Nor­dic Pavi­lion, whe­re Oulu is hos­ting its own pro­gram on June 4th: Expo 2025 Osa­ka – Oulu

Day 2: Star­tup Day at the Nor­dic Pavi­lion

The second day focused on Nor­dic Star­tup Day at the Nor­dic Pavi­lion with four ses­sions:

1. The sec­ret sauce of Nor­dic Star­tup Eco­sys­tem
2. University’s roles as Inno­va­tion Cata­lysts
3. Nor­dic Clean­tech star­tups pitc­hing ses­sion
4. Invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties in the Nor­dics for Japa­ne­se com­pa­nies.

I had the plea­su­re of joi­ning the last panel discus­sion mode­ra­ted by Tobias Mat­hia­sen, with spea­kers inclu­ding Shwe­tank Ver­ma from Leo Capi­tal, Hel­gi Her­manns­son from Nor­dur­ver, and Marek Kii­sa from Nor­dic­Nin­ja VC. We discus­sed why the New Nor­dics are a stra­te­gic region for Japa­ne­se inves­tors: sha­red values, high digi­ta­liza­tion, govern­ment sup­port, and a col­la­bo­ra­ti­ve busi­ness cul­tu­re.

After the event and some networ­king, we hop­ped on the bul­let train to Tokyo to pre­pa­re for the next chap­ter of the jour­ney.

Day 3: Pitc­hing Oulu in Tokyo

in Tokyo we star­ted with Sus­Hi Tech side event at the Tokyo Inno­va­tion Base. “Japan’s Gateway to the New Nor­dics”. I pitc­hed Oulu as the coo­lest star­tup city, sha­ring the sta­ge with 7 cities and 4 uni­ver­si­ties from across the Nor­dics, pre­sen­ting to a crowd of over 140 atten­dees.

A high­light of the event was the pre­sen­ta­tion of the report sum­ma­ry, crea­ted by NAVA (Nor­dic Asian Ven­tu­re Alliance) with JET­RO (Japan Exter­nal Tra­de Orga­niza­tion), on cur­rent Japa­ne­se invest­ment acti­vi­ty in Nor­dic count­ries. A great fin­ding to hear was that Fin­land has shown to be most con­sis­tent­ly sig­ni­ficant invest­ment choice for the Japa­ne­se VCs inves­ting into com­pa­nies or VC funds in the New Nor­dics between 2013–2024.

The full report will be soon avai­lable for public, so fol­low them on Lin­ke­dIn.

We wrap­ped up the day at the Tokyo Ven­tu­re Capi­tal Hub, whe­re we met with local inves­tors and explo­red poten­tial futu­re col­la­bo­ra­tions, inclu­ding some exci­ting leads for Polar Bear Pitc­hing 2026.

Day 4: Sus­Hi Tech Tokyo Opens

At Sus­Hi Tech Tokyo, I had the chance to pre­sent Oulu’s Smart City ini­tia­ti­ves at the Kira­bos­hi Bank Group booth and exis­ting coo­pe­ra­tion between Oulu and Japan. Great examples of tho­se are Oulu Test­Bed and MoU between Oulu Uni­ver­si­ty and Uni­ver­si­ty of Tokyo on 6G tech­no­lo­gy: Fin­land and Japan agree on 6G tech­no­lo­gy coo­pe­ra­tion | Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu

Read more about Smart City Oulu here: Smart City Oulu

It was also a joy to recon­nect with old friends and part­ners from JET­RO, Star­tup Hok­kai­do and Sen­dai City, exc­han­ging upda­tes and ideas for futu­re coo­pe­ra­tion. The lat­ter has been especial­ly worm as Oulu and Sen­dai have recent­ly renewed agree­ment between the cities: The 20-year coo­pe­ra­tion between the city of Oulu and Japan’s Sen­dai will con­ti­nue until 2030 | City of Oulu

Day 5: Wrap­ping Up with Old Friends and New Ideas

On our final day, we visi­ted the Japan Area Sta­ge, whe­re we gai­ned valuable insights into the country’s diver­se regio­nal star­tup eco­sys­tems. One of Japan’s key strengths lies in how its regions specia­lize in industries reflec­ting their unique assets. Which is why it’s worth explo­ring the­se regio­nal hubs based on your sec­tor. Tokyo stands is a power­house for tech­no­lo­gy, finance, and digi­tal inno­va­tion; Osa­ka is a lea­ding cent­re for life sciences, and health tech; and Hok­kai­do for example focuses on Food­Tech, Agri­Tech, and sus­tai­nable inno­va­tion.

A big disco­ve­ry from this Japan Area Sta­ge was also the Black Box news­let­ter, aimed at brin­ging all the infor­ma­tion about the Japa­ne­se eco­sys­tem and soft-lan­ding ser­vices in English: blackboxjp.com.

We ended the trip at the BIRTH Lab co-wor­king space, catc­hing up with our friends and orga­nizers of Polar Bear Pitc­hing Satel­li­te Event in Tokyo from Taka­gi Buil­ding Co. Ltd., CEO Hide­ku­ni Taka­gi, Yuta Aoki (also alum­ni for Polar Bear Pitc­hing 2019), Tat­su­ya Kon­do, and Dai Hori­kawa. We hope to establish a long-term coo­pe­ra­tion making BIRTH Lab the lea­ding orga­nizer of Polar Bear Pitc­hing in Japan.

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Final Reflec­tions

Whi­le Japan is a chal­len­ging mar­ket for foreign star­tups, but what I saw on the ground was huge network of regio­nal and govern­ment pro­grams as well as pri­va­te player rea­dy to pro­vi­de struc­tu­red sup­port for inter­na­tio­nal com­pa­nies. If you approach it with open mind, com­mit­ment, and res­pect for how trust is built in Japan, your will be rewar­ded with immen­se loy­al­ty and often fas­ter-than-expec­ted growth.

Mas­si­ve thanks to eve­ry­one who made this jour­ney so impact­ful, especial­ly Nor­dic Inno­va­tion House, our hosts in Osa­ka and Tokyo, and the many new friends and part­ners we met along the way. Loo­king forward to see­ing many of you again in Oulu or Japan soon!