Japan-Washington State AI Innovation Meetup

The Japan-Washington State AI Innovation Meetup is a unique business development meetup in which Washington State ICT Startups are able to meet with major Japanese multinational companies that are interested in acquiring innovative technologies. Many of the participating Japanese companies coming have revenue of more than $10 Billion and are brand name Global companies such as Softbank, Sony, NEC, Mitsui, Epson and more!

At the last meetup, a delegation of 15 Japanese multinational companies met with representatives from 80+ local technology startups, resulting in nearly 200 1-1 meetings during the course of the event!

The representatives attending for these companies are key decision makers for new business/product development and their engineering lead, CEOs, CTOs, or from Business Planning Divisions.

From large platform providers such as Microsoft and Amazon to startups, companies of all sizes participate in this event. Although the theme is AI, the Japanese business delegation are looking for services and utilities from all fields including development services and utilities, tools, chemical, machinery, finance and many other fields.

Meetup Agenda:

April 18 – 4 pm: Innovators Pitch Session at Private Reception

There is an invitation-only Innovators Pitch Session. To be invited, please indicate on the meetup registration form. Selected participants will be informed after reviewing requirements and qualifications. Please contact the organizer for more details.

During the session, the innovator participants will pitch their technologies in front of the entire Japanese delegation. Each company will have 5–7 min. to give a pitch plus networking opportunity at the end of the event with food at a very exclusive venue. There is a cost to participate in this pitch event. Contact the event organizers for more details.

April 19 – 10:30 am: Pre-event Tutorial by Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe
Location: Columbia Center 40th Floor Meeting Room, 701 5th Avenue, Seattle

This tutorial is designed to help Founders and Innovators to create a successful startup and work with Japanese companies.

April 19 – 1 pm: Japanese Business Delegation Reverse Pitch & Networking Session
Location: Columbia Center 40th Floor Meeting Room, 701 5th Avenue, Seattle

This is the main event where the Japanese delegation will reverse pitch to the local startup audience on the technologies and innovations they are looking for, as well as how they want to work with startups. Following the reverse pitches, there will be an opportunity to meet with each of the Japanese representatives and confirm an appointment for the One-on-One Meeting on the following day.

To participate in this pitch session, please register at the Eventbrite webpage. To be considered for the one-to-one meeting on April 20th, you must attend pitch session. When you register, please make sure to fill in what kind of technology/product/service your company offer and your URL

April 20 – 10 am-5 pm: One-on-One Sessions with Japanese companies
Location: Columbia Center 40th Floor Meeting Room, 701 5th Avenue, Seattle

Participants for the Meetup will have a chance to meet with individual Japanese delegation members for business discussions.

Each one-on-one session is 30 min.

If you would like to be considered for the one-on-one session on 26th, you must register for the Japanese Delegation Reverse Pitch on 25th and indicate your give brief description of your company and technology and your website URL under the Other Information section of the registration form. The information will be forwarded to the Japanese delegations in advance for their consideration.