OIST Innovators Society - Fireside chat

The Innovators Society is hosting a fireside chat with Japan-centric Angel Investors- Hiroaki Watatani and Yuki Shirato.

In contrast to venture capitalists, angel investors are typically wealthy individuals who invest their own money in early-stage startups in exchange for ownership equity or convertible debt. In recent years, angel investing has expanded to include large groups of investors who each contribute a small amount to crowdfund a much larger investment.

During this fireside chat moderated by Eli Lyons (entrepreneur-in-residence at OIST), Hiroaki and Yuki will talk about how they got into angel investing and their experience so far. They will also delve into what exactly angel investing is, what kind of startups is suitable for angel investments, and what profiles investors are looking for. Please join us if you are interested in learning more!

Date: Thursday, September 29^th, 2022

Time: 16:00-17:00

Venue: Seminar room L4F01 (Lab4)

These meetups are set up to encourage casual discussions – to inspire, motivate and help budding entrepreneurs at OIST. So, please feel free to join in and ask any questions that you may have.

Please feel free to contact Shivani or Eli for any questions. Share the word and see you all there!

Bios:

Hiroaki Watatani

Hiroaki is the founder of AS-Accelerator project, based in Saitama, Japan. During his MBA studies in Waseda Business School, he specialized in both Finance and Venture Capital. Having learned about the importance of efficient resource allocation to foster innovation, he designed a new collaboration model to seed entrepreneurs and promote their cooperation with Japanese SME firms to innovate.

Yuki Shirato

Yuki is a corporate lawyer specializing in Mergers and Acquisitions and founder of Yakumi, based in Tokyo, Japan. Yakumi provides a platform connecting global angel investors with promising startup and small companies primarily based in Japan. He also recently joined an up-and-coming startup- Braid Technologies as Chief Operating Officer (COO) after 9 years of experience as a startup lawyer.