With a prominent business culture and growing innovation, Osaka has become Asia’s hotspot for start-ups at the heart of Japan’s second-largest metropolis. However, it has long been overlooked by foreign investors. This culminated into a lack of funding for start-ups which hindered growth. Thus, Osaka Innovation Hub (OIH) was set up to support start-ups through acceleration programmes.

Discovering Japan: The Best of Osaka is a pitching and networking night featuring 5 Osaka start-ups under OIH Seed Acceleration. This collaborative event offers an open platform to promote the latest trends and build connections between start-ups and stakeholders from large corporations.

Join us at LEVEL3 as Takahisa Ohira - Head of Asia Unit at Deloitte Tohmatsu Venture Support, shares current trends of the Japanese Innovation ecosystem and how Osaka Innovation Hub Seed Acceleration Program boosts growth for start-ups in Osaka. Japanese food refreshments will be provided.

Takahisa Ohira, Regional Head of Asia - Deloitte Tohmatsu Venture Support

Takahisa Ohira leads the Asia team at Deloitte Tohmatsu Venture Support (DTVS), where he focuses on new business opportunities between Asian and Japanese innovation ecosystem stakeholders.      

He previously led the Platform Division and the FinTech team at DTVS.  With platform division, he led the expansion of Morning Pitch, Deloitte’s premier pitching event, into the largest pitching event in Japan.      

Ohira has consulted more than 15 Japanese large corporations on ideation, planning, and execution of new businesses since he joined DTVS. He has been an advisor to acceleration programs of prestigious financial institutions and a speaker at startup events such as FIBC, which is the Japan's biggest Fintech pitch event.