People

Narimasa Makino is a seasoned venture capitalist with 15 years of experience working with various successful international entrepreneurs. He was a co-founder and CEO of Darma Tech Labs, a Kyoto-based venture capital with technical consultants that focused on hardware startups. At Darma Tech Labs, he launched Makers Boot Camp, a hardware acceleration program and co-founded MBC Shisaku Fund I, the first Japanese venture fund of 2 billion yen that invests only in hardware companies in the US and Japan. Mr. Makino worked for Future Venture Capital and SunBridge Global Ventures, where he helped launch GVH Osaka, one of the first incubating communities in Osaka, the second largest city of Japan. At ASTEM in Kyoto, he helped various tech startups as Incubation Manager. Mr. Makino received an MBA from Kobe University.

Nobuhiro "Nob" Seki is a serial tech entrepreneur with a background in media and engineering. He co-founded FabFoundry, a New York-based platform for hardware startups that connects to essential resources such as investors. Nob led various projects such as Monozukuri Bootcamp and Monozukuri Hardware Cup Pitch Competition. He is a co-founding partner of MBC Shisaku Fund for hardware startups in the US and Japan. Previously, Nob served as an executive, including CEO, of Six Apart, a San Francisco-based pioneer of social media. He co-founded a multiplayer mobile role-playing location-based game platform in 2001 at Carnegie Mellon. At Nikkei's publication company, he launched MIT Technology Review Japan, working closely with the MIT community. Nob received an MBA from Carnegie Mellon and a B.S. in Engineering from The University of Tokyo.

In 1976, he joined the Japan Finance Corporation for Small and Medium Enterprises (JFC). In 1984, he participated in the establishment of Actus Power Drive Corporation as a joint venture between Nikki Denso Corporation and Meidensha Corporation, and became President and Representative Director. In 1991, he planned and established Unico Nikki Corporation, a joint venture with Unico Corporation, a medium-sized system engineering company located in Wisconsin, USA, and became its representative director. In January 2000, he joined Future Venture Capital Co. He joined Future Venture Capital Co., Ltd. as an advisor to the Investment Committee in January 2000, and became a director of Future Venture Capital in July 2000. After serving as Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer, he became Managing Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer in June 2009. , IZ Corporation, Displaytech 21 Inc. and Inventit Corporation. He has been the Representative Director of Holon Corporation since August 2008. He taught at Osaka University of Commerce, Ritsumeikan University, and a member of the Kyoto Prefectural Government and the Kinki Bureau of Economy. In July 2016, he joined Darma Tech Labs as a partner.

Sabrina was the first hire after our company was established in 2015. Since then, she's been fully focused on learning about early stage hardware startups. Her background of +14 years of experience in customer-centric businesses, working closely with entrepreneurs and corporate leaders from the US, Japan, France, Latin America & Scandinavia, helps to bridge cultural gaps startups need to face with diverse types of global stakeholders. She worked as Client Partner/Project Manager for leading US digital agencies Digitas/Razorfish (Publicis Groupe), Pão de Açucar (Casino Group) and W/McCann Erickson, helping B2B and B2C global brands's build digital experiences, including a business inteligence media dashboard for Brazil's #2 bank and e-CRM for Latin American's largest retail conglomerate. She has lived in the US, Japan, Switzerland and her home country Brazil.

As a scientist, serial entrepreneur and innovator in advanced materials, semiconductors, and foods, Tomo has extensive experience working for American and Asian companies, ranging from small garage startups to large corporations. Tomo’s combination of a broad experience with global companies, solid technological background, and business acumen have been applied into his work alongside our portfolio founders, bridging business engagement with innovative Asian companies exploring many commercial opportunities enabled by our portfolio startup's new businesses. He previously worked for Toray's U.S. subsidiary, Sumitomo Electric Industries, Toray Industries, and RIKEN. As part of Toray's new business development, he established a CVC, and since then, Tomo has consistently worked in the new business field, conducting vertical startups from research to commercialization. Tomo also founded a nanotechnology startup based on research conducted by his own group at RIKEN. After moving to the U.S., he worked as a research fellow at UATMC, Stanford University, and established Azalea Technology Partners in Silicon Valley. His range of expertise varies within Deeptech and food, including materials and processes. Ph.D. (major in Physics) from The Unversity of Tokyo

Born in 1957, Noriyuki Futagami graduated from Mechanical Engineering, Kobe University in 1980. After that, he completed his doctorate at the Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Kobe University in 2004. In 1981, he joined Sharp Corporation, where he was engaged in the mechanical design of microwave ovens for overseas markets. In 1984, he was transferred to the Third Research Laboratory, Computer Software Research C, Technology Division, where he was engaged in research on the shape processing technology used in 3D CAD. In 2005, he became Deputy General Manager of the Production Engineering Development and Promotion Division. He supervised the entire company's digital engineering design, developed production engineering equipment, and improved production at overseas plants and factories. He joined Monozukuri Ventures in July 2017. He has conducted more than 50 consulting projects for prototyping, mass production, and product development for startups and large companies.

In 1982, Yasuhiro Morimoto received an MSc in Engineering from Osaka University. After that, he joined Konica Minolta in 1982 as an electrical designer, and he was engaged in designing image processing circuits for digital camera products. In 2004, he became the leader of the image processing team at the Samsung Research Institute of Japan. In 2017, he joined Monozukuri Ventures as a technical consultant. He was involved in various consulting projects using his extensive knowledge in the optical, electrical, mechanical, and software fields. Through those projects, he has built connections with many domestic and international suppliers, which help startups from design and prototyping to mass production.

Born in Aichi Prefecture in 1958, Hiromichi Akatsuka graduated from the Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Gifu University in 1981 and joined Sony Corporation. From 1981 to 1998, he worked as an electrical engineer designing video circuits for laser disc players and DVD players. In 2008, he became a general manager of the DVD-related product businesses. Since 2018, he has been in charge of development at Dream Factory, which develops fitness and health equipment through OEM/ODM in China. In 2022, he joined Monozukuri Ventures as a technical consultant with a strong engineering and project managing background.

Joined Panasonic Group as a new graduate.　 After working as a development engineer, she implemented DX of the supply chain at various overseas locations, focusing on global ERP system planning for overseas factories. Received the company-wide President's Award. Then, she moved to Recruit Co. After directing a large-scale development project using an offshore Vietnamese company, she worked as a planner and product owner for several new businesses, and proposed a new business under the company's new business division. After transferring to a large-scale portal site, she was in charge of business strategy planning and business operations as a product manager, and organization manager, and achieved business growth of several tens of billions of yen. In 2020, she started her own business, managing inbound media for Japan. In addition, she is promoting projects in a wide range of business areas from strategy formulation, marketing, and product planning to development.