Timetable

Opening Remarks

Keiichi Yoshimura

Director General, Startup Strategy Promotion HeadquartersTokyo Metropolitan Government

Keiichi Yoshimura engaged in industrial and labor policy, including employment measures, support for SMEs, and financial affairs. He was appointed as the first Director General of the Office for Startup and Global Financial City Strategy, which was established at TMG in April, 2023.

JETRO Keynote: Japan’s Startup Ecosystem: Government Support and Opportunities

Tomohisa Izuno

Executive Director, Business Development & Public Relations, JETRO New York

Tomohisa Izuno is Executive Director of Business Development and Public Relations at Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO) New York, where he facilitates U.S. companies’ investment in Japan and supports Japanese firms—especially start-ups and SMEs—in expanding to the U.S. market, while promoting collaboration and business partnerships between Japanese and U.S. companies. He previously worked at JETRO’s Tokyo Headquarters in corporate planning and digital marketing and has overseas experience in Johannesburg.

Panel: How Japanese Cities Accelerate Innovation

Rina Shinoki

Director for Global Promotion, Startup Strategy Promotion Headquarters, Tokyo Metropolitan Government

She has extensive experience with administrative operations in government agencies. She has also gained specialized expertise in public relations. Through the SusHi Tech Tokyo initiative, she creates opportunities to address urban challenges and is committed to leaving a better city for future generations. She assumed her current position in April 2025.

Masahiro Nishikawa

Director, City of Yokohama

Masahiro Nishikawa serves as Director of the Office of the City of Yokohama Representative to the Americas, based in New York, a position he has held since April 2023. In this role, he leads Yokohama’s engagement with North American companies and institutions across both business and policy domains. Yokohama is Japan’s second-largest city and a major innovation hub within the world’s fourth-largest economy. Known for its strengths in sustainability, advanced manufacturing, and life sciences, the city offers an attractive base for global companies entering the Japanese market. Director Nishikawa’s work focuses on supporting North American companies expanding into Japan via Yokohama, facilitating partnerships in climate tech, life sciences, mobility, and advanced manufacturing, and connecting startups and corporates with public incentives, research networks, and proof-of-concept opportunities. He also represents Yokohama in international policy dialogues, including UN conferences, where he contributes perspectives on circular economy, decarbonization, and urban sustainability. Prior to his current role, he held positions within the City of Yokohama’s International Affairs Bureau, Medical Policy Bureau, and City Council Bureau. He holds an MPP from the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Tsukuba.

Atsunobu Kasagi

Director, Innovation Specialist , City of Kobe

Atsunobu Kasagi is an Innovation Specialist at the Silicon Valley office of the Kobe City Government, where he works to promote global innovation in Kobe by building partnerships with U.S. tech companies and universities, as well as attracting foreign businesses to the city. He is also currently enrolled in the Executive Master of Public Administration (EMPA) program at the University of Washington. Since 2019, Kasagi has led the international expansion of Kobe’s startup ecosystem, supporting local entrepreneurs in entering global markets and attracting tech companies and startups from the U.S. West Coast to Kobe. One of his major accomplishments includes launching the Microsoft AI Co-Innovation Lab in Kobe, a collaborative initiative with Microsoft and Kawasaki Heavy Industries that fosters innovation through AI technologies. He also partnered with the global accelerator 500 Global to plan and manage the 500KOBE program, helping startups scale and connect with international opportunities. More recently, he has been actively promoting industry-academia-government collaboration in Kobe, working with Kobe University and local companies to foster U.S.-Japan partnerships in medical engineering and to develop AI and digital talent. In this role, he played a central part in realizing a new inter-university partnership between Kobe University and Thomas Jefferson University, advancing joint education and research in medicine, medical engineering, and related fields across Kobe and Philadelphia. Prior to his work with the Kobe City Government, Kasagi served as Manager for International Affairs at the Japan Association of Corporate Executives (Keizai Doyukai), where he contributed to strengthening U.S.-Japan economic relations. He organized business delegations to Washington, D.C., and Silicon Valley, and helped develop policy proposals for the Japanese government. Kasagi began his career at NTT DOCOMO, where he gained extensive experience across domestic marketing, global business strategy, M&A, and human resource development. He holds a bachelor’s degree in international relations from the University of Tsukuba. He also writes and speaks on topics such as generative AI and startup trends in the U.S., and his work has been featured by JETRO, Nikkei, and Forbes Japan.

Shizuka Umehara

CEO, Square Up New York

• 2022-Current: CEO of Square Up Consulting, supporting international startups in expanding their business into the US market. Her services encompass U.S. corporate registration, market research, organizing exhibitions, event planning and management, strategic/tax/sales/marketing advisory, accelerator program mentoring, University lecturing, and various other aspects related to supporting the U.S. expansion of international startups. • 2015-2022: Worked at Deloitte Tohmatsu Venture Support Tokyo office. She was engaged in supporting the overseas expansion of Japanese startups and supporting female entrepreneurs. She supported multiple successful cases of small and medium-sized startups expanding overseas and business alliances between overseas startups and Japanese large corporations. She was responsible for a management training program run with government agencies and local governments that foster female entrepreneurs and spoke at symposiums for women entrepreneurs held all over the world. • 2007-2014: Worked as a tax professional at Ernst & Young's New York office and PriceWaterhouseCoopers' Los Angeles office. She was engaged in tax compliance advisory services for numerous Japanese companies in the US. • 2007: Completed M.S. in Accountancy from California State University Los Angeles.

Panel: Building Bridges — Collaboration between Japanese Corporates and U.S. Deep Tech Startups

Jim Adler

Founder and General Partner, Toyota Ventures

Jim Adler is the founder and general partner of Toyota Ventures, responsible for setting the strategic direction and leading the firm’s investment activities. In addition to serving on the board of directors for Toyota Ventures, he also serves as an executive advisor at Toyota Research Institute. He is a member of the board of directors for several Toyota Ventures portfolio companies, including Intuition Robotics, Moodify, Revel, and SLAMcore. He is also a board observer for Burro and Joby Aviation.He received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering with high honors from the University of Florida, and a master’s degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of California, San Diego.

Sahil Jain

SVP, Strategy, Newlab

Sahil Jain is a strategy and market development leader at Newlab, where he structures public–private partnerships that advance critical technology commercialization in sectors such as mining and critical minerals, industrial decarbonization, and advanced fuels. His work centers on transforming industrial regions through technology-driven economic development, with a proven ability to align industry, government, and emerging technology developers to build shared industrial infrastructure, mobilize capital resources, and deliver complex programs that advance technology scale-up and deployment. Headshot: see attached

Nobuhiro Seki

Founding Partner, Monozukuri Ventures

Nobuhiro “Nob” Seki is Founding Partner of Monozukuri Ventures, where he led hardware startups to successful growth in the U.S. and Japan. As an entrepreneur, he scaled a startup from single digits to hundreds of employees. A former tech journalist who interviewed thousands of technology leaders, he has built cross-border innovation programs for Japanese corporations and led initiatives including the Monozukuri Hardware Startup Consortium and New York Robotics. Nob holds an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University and an Engineering degree from the University of Tokyo.