Alumni Ventures Japan
Alumni Ventures is a US-based VC firm with approximately $1.4 billion in assets under management. Founded over a decade ago, the firm has over 11,000 LPs and over 12,000 portfolio companies, making over 300 investments annually. The firm’s proprietary deal flow network including universities and their alumni, and co-investment model with leading VC firms, focus on early- to growth-stage opportunities, emphasizing diversification across stage, sector, and geography.
We are pleased to announce that Alumni Ventures has established its Tokyo office as part of its long-term strategy to contribute to the Japanese start-up and venture capital (“VC”) ecosystem. This new base is their inaugural office in the APAC region and will serve as the firm’s regional hub to source investments and strengthen relationships in Japan and the region as a whole.
About Alumni Ventures
Alumni Ventures is a US-based VC firm with approximately $1.4 billion in assets under management. Founded over a decade ago, the firm has over 11,000 LPs and over 12,000 portfolio companies, making over 300 investments annually. The firm’s proprietary deal flow network including universities and their alumni, and co-investment model with leading VC firms, focus on early- to growth-stage opportunities, emphasizing diversification across stage, sector, and geography. For more information, please visit Alumni Ventures’ official website.
Strategic Vision for Japan
Q1: What are Alumni Ventures' strategic objectives and the specific value propositions in the Japanese market?
Ryan:
Alumni Ventures is one of the most active venture capital (“VC”) firms in the world, for example we invested in around 400 companies in 2025 alone. Our strategic goal and core value proposition for Japan is to help start-up companies “Go Global”. By “Go Global” we do not mean just establishing a US-based entity or dealing in USD but to connect Japanese start-ups with our network of top tier venture capital firms, individual investors, and financial institutions. In our model, we invest in companies as a minority co-investor alongside a top-tier lead investors. This way, we are able to collaborate with the leading venture capital firms rather than compete with them and allow us to invest in a large portfolio of companies.
Michael:
We believe that not only our VC firm network, but also our large network of US-based individual investors, portfolio companies, and institutions can help companies in Japan the same way they help each other. We also think that we have access to strong US investment opportunities which we can bring to investors in Japan as well. While we are fully diversified across stage and sector, we like to invest in early-stage companies, which allows us to get to know the businesses and management teams. The early stage is often when we can provide the most value to companies by using our network to make introductions to potential advisers, customers and business partners, as well as leading venture capital investors. We can subsequently continue to invest more capital in successful companies as they grow. This becomes a key element of our value proposition to Japanese start-ups – we can plug Japanese startups into our network and introduce them to additional sources of private capital from the US as they grow.
Q2: How long has Alumni Ventures been strategizing its expansion into Japan, and what factors influenced the timing of this initiative?
Ryan:
Alumni Ventures is a very young VC, established in 2014, but with hard work we have been able to successfully build a great track record in the US which made us into one of the top VCs in North America. When we look at our next generation strategies, half of the unicorns come from the US. The other 50% are coming outside of the US, so looking at our next generation growth it was natural to look outside of the US. Japan’s top 4 global GDP and top 3 in R&D spending globally were important factors for consideration. Moreover, Japanese people, in both the public sector (such as METI, MLIT) & private sector (such as CVCs) were very supportive of our 5 year startup development plan in Japan. In addition, Japanese universities shared that their graduates' mindsets are changing now. Top tier students are tending to pick a startup or build their own companies versus joining a large enterprise. As MGP notes that when he graduated from university in the US, if he told his parents that he wanted to go to a startup company they would not support it. But attitudes in the US began to change around 2000. We are now seeing this shift in Japan, so when my daughter tells me she wants to go to a startup company I can encourage her to try, so the local mindset is also important to consider. We describe the Japanese ecosystem as at an inflection point, and our job is investing into the future.
Michael:
Traditionally we have done 10-15% of our investing outside of the US and we do think more and more great investments outside of the US will be coming, so we would like to programmatically increase our ex-US investing to 30-35% in the next few years. About two years ago we began to strategize an Asia expansion, and we first came to Japan about a year and a half ago. There are multiple factors why we chose Japan over other countries. One of those being Ryan, who initially worked with us as a Japan-based venture partner, allowing him to foster relationships and evaluate the market locally between our trips from the US.. And we got additional support from the government, agencies, and other programs, which was particularly helpful. We also have a good network of people who went to school in the US but live here. Around autumn last year, we became confident about the ecosystem and opportunities in Japan, so instead of remotely trying to do something we committed to the Japanese market with my relocation and the opening of our office. At the same time, we also confirmed that Japan is a good place to be a center point to be our HQ in Asia to raise capital and find investments both in Japan and in Asia. Once we made a decision we tried to move as quickly as possible to get situated. I am happy we were able to form our entity last year, in 2025, and open an office here in January.
Q3: In what ways do you anticipate Alumni Ventures’ presence in Tokyo will enhance relationships with existing and potential Japanese investors/business partners?
Michael:
Just being here in person and in the same time zone is important when you are trying to work with people in Japan and Asia broadly. It is certainly easier to schedule meetings or make introductions during normal business hours, and being here in person allows us to participate in events and hold meetings with people throughout the entire country, which helps with building our network.
Ryan:
These networks we aim to build involve not only our startup investment activities but also those of our LPs, who provide the capital that fuels our investments in Japanese startups. These are large corporations or universities, and it is quite important for us to align their strategy and our strategy. Our Japanese LPs also want to contribute to the Japanese ecosystem and help Japanese startups “go global”. Our strategic partners are important to us to empower our strategic goals in Japan, which makes being in Tokyo important.
Why Tokyo?
Q4: What were the primary reasons for selecting Tokyo as the location for your Japanese headquarters among the major cities in Japan?
Michael:
Other cities like Osaka, Fukuoka, and Sapporo are great, but the location of Tokyo is conducive to accessing all of the regions within Japan, as well as traveling to other jurisdictions in Asia and the United States.
Ryan:
With great national corporations and large universities being in Tokyo, coupled with 70-80% of fundraising happening in universities, the concentration of money and location made Tokyo a natural choice for us to contribute to the greater Japanese ecosystem.
Q5: In what ways does Tokyo offer distinct strategic advantages over other major financial hubs in the APAC region such as Singapore or Hong Kong?
In case your Tokyo office is your first APAC region office, please also comment why you have chosen Tokyo while it may have a higher tax rate than Singapore/Hong Kong.
Michael:
Tax was not the primary driver for choosing Tokyo, although we appreciate and recognize that the government is looking at tax reform that can help venture capital firms raise and deploy capital here. We chose Tokyo over other major APAC financial hubs because of where they are in their venture capital ecosystem development. Tokyo also has a preferable national advantage because Japan has had a good relationship with the US for a long time.
Ryan:
In the US we are one of the most active in the space sector among our investments. When we pick a great space company we are looking at the current geopolitical situation, for example, we think Japan could be a great fit with our space-tech company. It also is an important aspect that we can really contribute to that ecosystem. For example if we pick India, they might have a very significant market but it may be really challenging to find how we can contribute to that ecosystem. One of our frameworks is to bring a great VC as a lead investor and that really works well in Japan.
Setup Experience and Local Support
Q6: What challenges did you encounter during the setup process in Tokyo, and how did you address them?
Michael:
Even with local support establishing a presence in Japan can be difficult and time consuming, for example creating entity registration, formation plan, getting visa, etc., but perseverance is the way to address it. Just keep trying.
Ryan:
Japan has unique cultural specificities with necessities and complexities that were hard for our US colleagues to understand without being here, such as the requirement of a corporate seal and a bank seal. Our colleagues in the US had no idea of the concept of Zenkaku Nyuuryoku, typing in a bit larger character. Bank account opening had to be completely in Japanese. Even mega-banks do not have an English page or portal. Japan has already established their own system and setup, and that is sometimes quite unique and difficult to explain to people outside of Japan.
Q7: How have FinCity.Tokyo and Visual Alpha supported your establishment in Tokyo, and which aspects of their assistance did you find most beneficial?
Ryan:
FinCity.Tokyo and Visual Alpha were super helpful to us. Their guidelines were very clear by asking adequate questions to understand our situations and telling us where to go, what needed to be done and when it needed to be done, rather than just saying “if anything we can do it please let us know” without telling us what exactly they can support. Even among Japanese people, not many have experience applying for subsidies from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, so having support from Visual Alpha and FinCity.Tokyo to define timelines and give us clear milestones was very important.
Q8: Reflecting on the establishment process, what insights or recommendations would you offer to other companies considering expansion into Tokyo?
Michael:
I would say to try talking to FinCity.Tokyo, Visual Alpha, and some of the other supporting service providers early in order to obtain the great information that they provide and help you set a game plan. The farther in advance the better. In our case, we made a decision in the middle of the summer and tried to get an office in a few months. If we had done it in 9 months instead of 5 it definitely would have been easier.