Samurai Incubate launches Japan, Israel-focused fund

The vehicle, Samurai's fifth, has raised JPY500 million ($4.17 million) so far and will dedicate roughly half its corpus to Israeli companies, with the other half being put to work in Japan. The fund is targeting a final close of JPY1 billion by the middle of the year but if investor appetite is sufficient the vehicle could as much as double in size.

The fund, which is looking to invest in 30 Israeli and Japanese companies in the next year, will commit around JPY 1 million per company. Samurai has already made two investments in Israel via it previous fund: Zerobillbank, a platform for micro-donations; and Aniwo, a Japanese-founded online fundraising platform.

Shohei Ando is operation manager at Samurai and part of the three-man team posted to Israel set up the firm's Tel Aviv office. He explains that Samurai started to look at Israel after forming connections with Israeli entrepreneurs attending its Tokyo-based incubator program.

"Our incubator is open for everyone and we have already attracted a lot of attention from Israeli entrepreneurs and investors," he tells AVCJ. "Israel is a small country adn the networks are very strong, so investors introduced us to start-ups and vice-versa. It really was quite viral and our network has grown fast."

Samurai Incubate was set up in 2008 by Kentaro Sakakibara. It has invested in more than 70 companies to date.

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