UPWARD, which was selected as a J-Startup company last year, participated in the "J-Startup Hour, a program sponsored by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. A panel discussion was held with special guest Mr. Yo Kurabayashi, Managing Partner / Head of Japan, DNX Ventures, on how to make a breakthrough in sales digital transformation, a management issue that needs to be addressed intensively now more than ever.
Mr. Yoshiaki Ishii, Director, New Business canada telegram phone number list Creation Promotion Office, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Japan, was also a keynote speaker. Under the slogan of "Reinvigorating Japanese Industry," Mr. Ishii spoke about the expected role of startups and the future prospects of the startup ecosystem.
Yoshiaki Ishii (Director, Office of New Business Creation Promotion, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry)
Mr. Ishii has been involved in venture and SME policies at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), where he was in charge of establishing various programs such as the LLC/LLP legislation, Japan Venture Award, Startup Next Innovator, and J-Startup. He holds a B.A. in International Political Economy from Aoyama Gakuin University and a M.B.A. in Commerce from Waseda University. D. (Commerce). in charge of startup ecosystem formation and open innovation promotion at the Cabinet Office since 2018. 21 years in his current position.
Yo Kurabayashi (Managing Partner / Head of Japan, DNX Ventures)
After working as a venture capitalist at Fujitsu Limited and Mitsui & Co. in Japan and the U.S., Yo has served as the Japan Representative of Globespan Capital Partners and Salesforce Ventures. Managing Partner and Japan Representative of DNX Ventures since March 2015. He holds a Ph.D. from Doshisha University and a B.A. from the Wharton School of Management at the University of Pennsylvania.
Ryusuke Kaneki (President and CEO, UPWARD Corporation)
Born in Tokyo in 1973, Ryusuke Kaneki is an expert in location-based services (LBS) and geographic information systems (GIS), and has built more than 200 GIS-related systems. He founded "UPWARD," Japan's first next-generation sales support SaaS that highly integrates maps and location information with Salesforce. Currently, UPWARD has been implemented by more than 300 companies, mainly major corporations, and boasts the top market share in Japan as a cloud service for field sales.
