ON&BOARD Co., Ltd. (General Partners: Masato Shimodaira, Kosuke Nakayama, Location: Toranomon, Minato-ku,Tokyo) is pleased to announce the establishment of its 1st Fund (officially named ON&BOARD Investment Limited Partnership), supported by major financial institutions.

This fund has successfully closed its first round and will commence active investment in startups at various stages of their development. Our mission, "ONBOARD New Tech & Top Teams Faster than Ever," aims to foster the creation of unicorn companies and address global and Japanese societal challenges through the provision of risk capital from the early stages of startups.

Website: https://onboardvc.com/

Active Investment in Early-Stage Startups

In a world facing severe issues like climate change, Japan is particularly ahead in dealing with unique advanced economy challenges such as an aging population and declining birthrate. To ensure the sustainability of Japanese society, swift solutions to these problems are essential. With this perspective, the Company is committed to proactively investing in and providing hands-on support to startups and entrepreneurs with the potential to become the next unicorns, starting from the pre-seed and seed stages.

We have already committed to investing in one pre-seed startup and will continue to accelerate our investments in promising startups.

Comprehensive Hands-On Support from Startup to IPO/Exit

Our general partners and venture capitalists come from diverse backgrounds, including strategic consulting firms, major IT platform companies with experience in business strategy formulation and new business creation, major trading companies with cross-border investment and hands-on experience, lawyers, and active researchers and engineers in neuroscience and artificial intelligence.

Moreover, we have appointed top industry players as advisors, including Riku Sugie, the current CEO of Paidy, who successfully led the company to a 300 billion yen M&A exit; Hitoshi Matsubara, a leading figure in AI research and former president of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence; Hitoshi Nishikawa, with experience as CTO and CPO in AI startups and expertise in natural language processing; and Kohei Hamada, founder of Monokabu, one of Japan's largest sneaker trading platforms, now integrated into SODA. This team ensures a comprehensive support system from the startup phase to IPO.

Startup Support Program "Out of BOUNDS"

Our "Out of BOUNDS" startup support program will be held regularly. This program aims to increase the number and quality of promising Japanese entrepreneurs through unique training programs and business concept sessions. We will also invite guest entrepreneurs to our fund to promote business creation. Detailed information about the program will be announced and open for applications soon.

Website: https://onboardvc.com/outofbounds

Entrepreneurship Media "ON&BOARD TIMES"

We are launching "ON&BOARD TIMES," a media platform to provide current information and insights on entrepreneurship.

https://onboardvc.com/media/

This media will offer various knowledge about entrepreneurship through regular video and podcast distributions, focusing on business creation methods, early-stage strategies, deep tech, and global expansion technologies. Additionally, it will include a calendar for challengers, startup-related news for entrepreneurs and CxOs (both in the US and Japan), and recommended articles from our fund members, aiming to enhance the knowledge base of the domestic startup ecosystem. We encourage you to subscribe and stay updated.

We welcome consultations not only for funding but also from the early stages of business creation.

【SNS】
Spotify for Podcasters：https://open.spotify.com/show/6SemnAWFkkvVYwIDqy6Zgr
X：https://twitter.com/on_board_vc
YouTube：https://www.youtube.com/@on_board_vc
Facebook：https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61560587639201
LinkedIn：https://linkedin.com/company/on-board-vc
TikTok：https://www.tiktok.com/@onboardvc
LINE：https://page.line.me/470pstki

Fund Overview

Name: ON&BOARD Investment Limited Partnership
Established: June 2024
Main Investment Targets: Early-stage startups
General Partners: ON&BOARD Co., Ltd. (General Partners: Masato Shimodaira, Kosuke Nakayama)

Key Members' Profiles

Masato Shimodaira_General Partner
After working as a lawyer in a law firm, Mr. Shimodaira joined LINE Corporation (now LINE Yahoo Corporation) as an in-house attorney and engaged in new business development in the AI field.

In 2018, he joined the investment division of Dream Incubator Inc., where he founded the venture capital firm, focusing on investing in and supporting startups, leading to nine successful exits. In 2023, he founded the venture capital firm ON&BOARD.

Mr. Shimodaira holds a degree in Law from Hitotsubashi University and a Juris Doctor degree from Keio University Law School.

Additional Roles:

• Pro Picker at NewsPicks
• Instructor of "Startup Management Strategy Textbook" on Udemy

Kosuke Nakayama_General Partner
Mr. Nakayama joined Dream Incubator in 2016, where he engaged in startup investment and support in Japan and India, consulting for large corporations. In 2019, he contributed to the founding of the venture capital firm, achieving exits for five portfolio companies. In 2022, he joined IT platform company, where he was responsible for calculating the Economics of major services and formulating mid-term plans. In 2023, he co-founded the venture capital firm ON&BOARD. 

Shunsuke Hasegawa_Partner
Mr. Hasegawa engaged in a wide range of responsibilities at Mitsubishi Corporation since joining in 2009. He handled trading operations related to defense and automotive sectors, led product planning and sales operations at an automotive distribution company in Indonesia, and managed numerous investment, business revitalization, and divestiture proposals at Investment Committee, Head Office of Mitsubishi Corporation. He also engaged in strategic planning in the Automotive Business Division.

Witnessing the shifts in Japan's industrial competitiveness through his work, he was driven by a desire to directly foster Japanese-origin innovations, leading him to co-found ON&BOARD.

Yuki Takeuchi_Tech Executive
Graduated from the University of Tokyo, Faculty of Pharmacy.
During academic years, diverse professional experiences were acquired, including an intern at a venture capital firm. Post-graduation, served as a consultant before co-founding ON&BOARD.

An integral member of the Beyond AI Institute, leading key research themes under the guidance of Professor Yuji Ikegaya. Research spans neuroscience and artificial intelligence, with affiliations to the  Society for Neuroscience. 

Riku Sugie_Growth Advisor
Mr. Sugie graduated from the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tokyo and began his career at Fuji Bank, now known as Mizuho Financial Group. He later moved to Accenture, before joining GE Consumer Finance in 2006. Following the company's acquisition by Shinsei Bank Group and its subsequent renaming to Shinsei Financial in 2009, Mr. Sugie was appointed as the President and CEO in 2012. In 2016, he also served as Managing Director at Shinsei Bank. He took on the role of President and CEO at Paidy in November 2017. Under his leadership, Paidy was acquired by PayPal in October 2021 for 300 billion yen. As of November 2021, he has also been serving as a Vice President at PayPal headquarters. Mr. Sugie holds an MBA and a Master's in Financial Engineering from Columbia University. In 2024, he also took on the role of advisor at ON&BOARD.

Hitoshi Matsubara_Technology Advisor
Dr. Matsubara completed his Ph.D. in Information Engineering at the University of Tokyo, focusing on knowledge representation and utilization in intelligent robots. A consistent researcher in robotics and AI, he has received numerous academic awards. As a leading expert in computer shogi, he won the first Computer Shogi Association Award and became a professor at the School of Systems Information Science at Future University Hakodate in 2000. Beyond academia, Dr. Matsubara has significant industry experience, founding Mirai Share, a university-based startup offering AI-driven bus and taxi sharing services. He served as president of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence in 2014 and became a professor at the University of Tokyo's Graduate School of Information Science and Technology in 2020. Currently, he leads the Center for Informatics Education and Research at Kyoto Tachibana University, striving to establish it as a premier information education and research hub in Kansai. At ON&BOARD, Dr. Matsubara advises on innovation development strategies.

Hitoshi Nishikawa_Technology Advisor
Completed a doctoral program at Nara Institute of Science and Technology and earned an International MBA from IE Business School with Beta Gamma Sigma honors. Holds a PhD in Engineering and an MBA. Specializes in artificial intelligence, particularly natural language processing, with a focus on natural language generation and automatic summarization. Recipient of numerous awards, including the IPSJ Research Committee's Recommended Doctoral Dissertation and the JSAI Best Paper Award. Has experience at NTT Media Intelligence Laboratories and Tokyo Institute of Technology, and has been involved in startup management, handling everything from fundraising and organizational development to new business development, product development, and R&D. As an advisor at ON&BOARD, provides guidance in the intersection of business and technology, including setting up technical teams and launching products.

Company Overview