Jason Reacts To Japanese Founder Pitches + Fireside Chat With Yuki Shirato

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Today’s show:

AssetHub built an AI agent that recreates licensed characters in 3D while respecting copyright rules... But Jason says he needs to think BIGGER. 11 founders pitched their companies to Jason and Yuki Shirato of Techstars Tokyo at our Osaka event this week, and neither investor held back.

Find out why Jason says Seekr feels more like a vitamin than a painkiller, and needs to ditch the press mentions from their deck. Plus, a vital lesson for founders: if everyone already knows about the problem you're solving, investors expect a tight solution and business plan. Truly novel business ideas get more leeway. Japan's startup community is booming, with many recent grads bailing on lifelong gigs at major corporations to start companies. But here's why Yuki says the fear of failure is still holding back progress.



Guests:

Yuki Shirato on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yuki-shirato

Techstars Tokyo: https://www.techstars.com/accelerators/tokyo



Founder Pitches:

Seekr: https://seekrai.global/product

Arabat: https://arabat.it/

AssetHub: https://assethub.io/

CRAZIA: https://crazia.co/

JuJuJuu: https://jujujuu.com/

JAPANMEDIA: https://lp.japanmedia.ai/

Tsuin AI: https://www.tsuin.ai

Rumi Light: https://www.rumilight.jp/

GENCHI: https://www.toraru.me/en

TattvaSilicon: https://tattvasilicon.com/

Mimi AI: https://nihongo-chat-ruby.vercel.app/onboarding



Relevant Links:

Founder University Japan, Jason's pre-accelerator program with JETRO → https://japan.founder.university/

Techstars Tokyo announces its Class of 2026 → https://www.techstars.com/newsroom/techstars-tokyo-accelerator-announces-class-of-2026

Yuki Shirato on why Japan should be on every founder's radar (Techstars) → https://www.techstars.com/blog/insights-and-trends/should-japan-be-on-your-radar-as-a-founder

How Techstars Tokyo is helping make Japan a global startup hub (The Japan Times) → https://www.japantimes.co.jp/2025/12/25/special-supplements/accelerating-business-ambitions-global-scale-techstars-tokyo/

VidiLabs, maker of the Seekr indoor positioning platform → https://seekrai.global/

Density, the people-counting sensor company Jason has backed for a decade → https://www.density.io

Arabat, recovering critical minerals from batteries with citrus and farm waste → https://arabat.it/

AssetHub raises a $2M seed for its AI 3D platform (The Bridge) → https://thebridge.jp/en/2025/08/aix3d-production-platform-assethub-raises-approximately-¥300-million-in-seed-funding

Seedance 2.0, the ByteDance AI video model Jason says fans are using to make Marvel shorts → https://seed.bytedance.com/en/blog/seedance-2-0-official-launch

Bending Spoons, the company Jason cites for buying apps and running them with tiny AI-powered teams (TechCrunch) → https://techcrunch.com/2025/10/31/what-is-bending-spoons-everything-to-know-about-aols-acquirer/

Burning Chrome by William Gibson, the source of “the street finds its own uses for things” → https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ICMWZH4/



Timestamps:

00:00:00 Jason's first trip to Japan and the food crawl

00:03:07 Why everyone in Japan acts like a founder

00:03:42 Founder University comes to Japan

00:08:44 Techstars Tokyo and Japan's push for global founders

00:10:28 Why Japanese startups stay on the island

00:12:44 Parents, lifetime jobs, and the fear of failure

00:15:13 How Japan mastered product market fit

00:18:43 Lightfield: Name one person who's ever enjoyed updating a CRM. Exactly. Lightfield's AI agent does it for you - it even prospects and books your meetings. Used by thousands of startups. Free at https://lightfield.app

00:20:10 The white lab coat and the man who named his daughter Cinnamon

00:25:05 Seekr: centimeter-precise indoor navigation

00:27:38 Why investors want the business case, not the press

00:28:21 Rippling: Thanks to our partners at Rippling! Head to https://Rippling.ai/twist and get the only AI built to give you full visibility across your startup and take complex actions across your entire business.

00:34:54 Arabat: recovering rare earths with orange peels

00:38:26 Getting from free pilots to paid pilots

00:38:38 Upwork: Upwork helps businesses find highly skilled freelance professionals for specialized work. Post your job for free at https://upwork.com

00:43:57 AssetHub: AI 3D models for anime and game IP

00:52:40 Come for the tool, stay for the marketplace

00:54:35 CRAZIA: turning customer conversations into growth

00:56:42 JuJuJuu: giving alternative protein the structure of steak

00:59:02 JAPANMEDIA: AI manga and anime at a fifth of the cost

01:01:24 Tsuin AI: AI twins that think and act like you

01:03:15 Picking the layup and the wild card

01:09:29 Rumi Light: faster data paths inside AI servers

01:11:40 GENCHI: a local avatar that shops Japan for you

01:13:51 TattvaSilicon: analog circuit design in a day

01:15:36 Mimi AI: learning to actually speak Japanese

01:17:51 Why a live shopping avatar is Jason's wild card



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