An interview with Infinity Ventures: Entrepreneurial advice for startup ecosytems
1) Please tell us about the history of Infinity Ventures, the massive global footprint that you have and how did the partners meet?
Prior to starting Infinity Ventures, I was running Adobe’s corporate VC investment in Asia covering Greater China, Japan, Korea and India so already familiar with the regional dynamics. And prior to that, I was based in Silicon Valley.
2) Scaling a fund into a global network and brand must have been hard. How have Infinity Ventures been able to do it?
While we look at global trends we focus regionally. In the past, our focus was on Japan and Greater China and now we are starting to look at SE Asia as well.
3) Infinity Ventures Summit, one of the flagship conferences that you host is regarded as one of Japan's leading conferences. What is the reason that drives you to host the conference and how have you made it stand out from a plethora of other tech conferences?
IVS originated over 10 years ago there was no such conference for founders of Internet companies. So it is the longest-running such event in Japan. And typically with Ver 500 founders attending it is also largest. We are running the event so that we can grow the community of entrepreneurs.
4) You have had many investments over the years. what has been the biggest learnings and opportunities that you have witnessed?
6) Japanese corporations and Corporate Venture Capitalists are increasing their activity, especially in Southeast Asia, both as an investor and business partner. What are your views on them and how should Asian companies prepare to work with Japanese conglomerates?
I think for the most part it’s a positive trend as Japan is now trying to export its capital and expertise to these markets. One thing people should know is that (although there are always exceptions), Japanese companies tend to operate at a different speed (due to partly cultural and partly structural reasons). So need to set the right expectations. But you may find, once they make the commitment, they often become long-term partners.
7) How can entrepreneurs best pitch to VCs like Infinity Ventures and what is the key criteria that a startup must prepare in order to get investment from you?
For us, we are looking for a few traits. We want to understand the market you are in (both geographic and sector senses). We like bigger growth trends and international stories. And we also like founders with strong engineering backgrounds (partly my bias). And we definitely like to spend time with the product/service that you may be building and any analytics you run behind it.
8) What are your geographical and vertical/industry focuses in terms of investments in the near future? Will you also be more active in Southeast Asia?
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