VCs back $41m investment in Japan's WealthNavi

Mirai Creation Fund, Global Brain, Sony Innovation Fund, DBJ Capital, SMBC Venture Capital and Mizuho Capital contributed to the investment. The capital will be used for product development and expansion of the user base.

Founded in 2015, WealthNavi offers a robo-advisor service which conducts fully automated asset management and supplies products such as Mametasu, a marketing and recruiting application for corporate clients. According to a statement, the company is the largest of its kind in Japan and managed 70,000 customer accounts worth JPY60 billion as of last month.

Mirai described WealthNavi as a “manufacturing financial institution” noting that about half of its employees were engineers, designers and other professionals focused on product creation. Local robo-advisory competitors include Rakuten Securities, Monex-Saison-Vanguard and Money Design. The latter has received VC funding.

Mirai was launched in 2015 by Toyota Motor, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Sparx Group as a JPY13.5 billion fund focused on artificial intelligence, robotics, and environmental technologies. As of September last year, it claimed assets under management of JPY36.7 billion across about 30 portfolio companies.

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• Topics
• North Asia
• Financials
• Technology
• Early-stage
• Japan
• Global Brain Corporation
• SMBC Venture Capital
• Mizuho Capital
• Financial Services