NordicNinja VC establishes office in Helsinki

Launched in partnership with Panasonic, Honda, Omron and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), the new fund makes investments of two to five million euros in deep tech scale-ups in industries such as autonomous mobility, AI, VR and IoT.

“Today, the Nordic startup ecosystem and Japanese blue-chip companies represent something of a missed opportunity in terms of potential growth and cooperation,” Marek Kiisa, managing partner at NordicNinja VC, said in a release. “Japan is still on its way to finding its place in the startup innovation space and this fund is directly designed to support these connections between the Nordics and Asia.”

In addition to the funding boost, successful scale-ups receive knowledge and technological expertise from local corporate partners to help them to thrive in the complex Asian business markets. According to Tomosaku Sohara, managing partner at NordicNinja VC, this local tech expertise makes these regions particularly attractive places to operate from.

“The Nordic and Baltic regions have rapidly evolving startup ecosystems strategically located between Europe and Asia,” he stated. “We can now bridge the gap between the Nordic and Japanese ecosystems and spearhead a startup revolution that shakes up the traditional corporate culture in Japan.”