Founders Across Borders: Japan as a Launchpad - Building Global Startups from Tokyo in 2026
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Most conversations about Japan and startups focus on how hard it is to break in. This one flips the question: what does it actually look like to build from Tokyo and scale out?
We're bringing together founders and ecosystem builders who are navigating this from different positions — someone helping Japanese companies expand abroad, someone scaling a US business from a Tokyo base, and someone who has spent a decade arguing that the real bottleneck in Japan's startup ecosystem isn't the startups.
What you'll learn:
What's shifted in Tokyo's startup ecosystem.
How founders are using Japan as a base to reach the US and beyond.
How startups and corporates in Japan are — and aren't — working together.
What a realistic path to cross-border scale looks like from here.
Who should attend:
Founders based in Japan or considering it as a base.
Business leaders navigating international expansion.
VCs who want to better support their portfolio companies going global.
This is a panel conversation with Q&A — not a keynote. Questions welcome in English and Japanese.
Speakers
Hiro Nishiguchi — President, Startup Genome Japan Managing Director of Global Entrepreneurship Network Japan and Japan Director for UC Berkeley Executive Education (Haas School of Business). Hiro has spent over a decade connecting Japan's startup ecosystem with corporations, investors, and policymakers worldwide. His core argument: the bottleneck isn't the startups — it's corporate Japan's ability to move fast enough to work with them.
Yuli Shein — Co-Director, Founder Institute Japan | Co-Founder & COO, Openfor.co Over 12 years working across India, the US, and Japan helping companies — from startups to global enterprises — expand internationally through partnerships. Based in Tokyo, she now leads Founder Institute Japan while building Openfor.co, a global platform for cross-border collaboration.
Alexander De Vore — CEO, MadeHere.
Born and raised in the western United States, Alex has spent the last decade building MadeHere from Japan. He's grown an advanced manufacturing business in Yokohama into one with clients spanning Japanese government agencies, global aerospace, and US defense. His path is the "Japan as launchpad" thesis in practice: a Western founder who planted roots here, built real institutional credibility, and is now scaling outward across the Pacific.
Moderator
Karen Onuma — Co-Founder & COO, GlobalDeal Japanese-German by background, Karen works across founders, VCs, accelerators, and public organizations in Japan, the US, and Europe — hearing how the same expansion challenges get described very differently depending on who you ask.
About GlobalDeal GlobalDeal is an AI platform that executes cross-border market entry end to end — from strategy through partner identification, outreach, and ongoing operations. Built for deep-tech companies expanding into and out of Japan, the US, and Europe.