Directors
Chairman
Tohru Akaura
Incubate Fund(General Partner & Co-Founder)
August 7, 1968:Born March 1991:Graduated from the School of Engineering(control engineering), Tokai University April 1991:Joined Japan Associated Finance Co., Ltd.(now JAFCO Co., Ltd.) and engaged as investment professional at Tokyo / Hiroshima office for eight and half years October 1999:Established as independent venture capitalist. Since then, he has raised JPY 27.5 billion through 11 VC funds and consistently engaged in the seed-stage focused investment and incubation April 2003:Councilor of Information-technology Promotion Agency (2003-2008) May 2005:Got the 2nd IPA Award(commercialization support dept.) July 2013:Director of JVCA July 2015:Managing Director of JVCA
Chairman
Shinzo Nakano
ITOCHU Technology Ventures, Inc(President and CEO)
Shinzo Nakano is President & CEO of Itochu Technology Ventures, Inc.(ITV). ITV is a subsidiary of Itochu Corporation, one of the largest trading conglomerates in Japan. He founded ITV in 2000 as a general partner and raised its first fund for $83M from Itochu Corp and other institutional investors. He was named President and CEO of ITV in 2015 and currently runs its 5th fund. ITV invests in IT related startups in Japan and abroad. He received BA in Law at Keio University and joined Itochu Corporation in 1989.
Senior Managing Director
Makoto Takano
D4V LLC(CEO & GP)
Mr. Takano is CEO & GP of D4V (Design for Ventures, a joint venture capital firm with IDEO) , CEO of linkties Co., Ltd. (Founder of Forbes JAPAN),and CEO of MT Partners. Prior to joining Forbes JAPAN in 2014, he was Managing Director and President of PIMCO Japan Ltd. Before joining PIMCO in 2001, he was head of marketing at Goldman Sachs Asset Management.
Mr. Takano’s prior experience also includes work at Daiwa Securities where he was head of the strategist team at Daiwa Institute of Research. Mr. Takano has published extensively on the capital markets. In 1992, he was awarded Securities Analysts Journal Prize by the Securities Analyst Association of Japan. He holds master’s and undergraduate degrees in engineering from Waseda University.