Yohei Sawayama

Founding Partner at Coral Capital

Yohei Sawayama

Founding Partner at Coral Capital

Tokyo, Tokyo

Overview

Work Experience

Coral Capital

Founding Partner
2019 - Current
Managing $45M (JPY5B) VC fund focusing on seed stage startups in Japan. Coral Capital is the same team that launched 500 Startups Japan. https://coralcap.co/

500 Startups

Venture Partner, Managing Partner of 500 Startups Japan
2015
Managing $35m fund for Japan. Fundraising, Investing, Building ecosystem through education and event, Advising corporates about how to collaborate with startups, etc... aka everything.

Nomura

Researcher
2012 - 2015
Venture researcher in IT sector. I research/support/evaluate IT startups. I interview 150-200 CEOs of startups and write in-house research reports. I collect startup-related information through Nomura Securities' countrywide network. And I also attend 100+ seminars/events/forums per year, to seek 'cool' startups. I visit several listed companies as well, to seek the alliance opportunities between them and startups. Track records: April 2015 - IPO of Gunosy, $332M (market cap. at first price) News curation app provider. Dec 2014 - IPO of bengo4.com, $230M (market cap. at first price) Review site about Japanese attorney. 6.6M UU on Jul 2014. 20% of attorneys in Japan are registered. Aug 2014 - IPO of LOCKON, $152M (market cap. at first price) LOCKON is an adtech company. They provide an online marketing measurement suite "AD EBiS", a listing ads management platform "THREe" and most popular E-commerce open platform "EC-CUBE". Jul 2014 - IPO of VOYAGE GROUP, $372M (market cap. at first price) VOYAGE GROUP is a conglomerate company consisted of 20+ internet services. Media and adtech business is the main growth driver. Jun 2014 - IPO of FreakOut, $421M (market cap. at first price) FreakOut is a pioneer and a market leader of DSP and DMP in Japan. This is the first adtech IPO in Japan. Mar 2014 - IPO of DLE, $125M (market cap. at first price) "Fast entertainment" provider. Provide flash-based original animation series and movies, such as "Secret Society Eagle Talon." They provide marketing solutions using their own IP (animation characters) portfolio. Mar 2014 - IPO of Minnano Wedding, $261M (market cap. at first price) Review site for wedding places. Users can check the "real expense" on the site. Dec 2013 - IPO of Allied Architects, $230M (market cap. at first price) Providing social media marketing service called "MONIPLA." This is the first Facebook related startup's IPO in Japan.

JPMorgan Chase

Investment Banking Analyst
2009 - 2012
Investment banking, M&A and financial advisory. Track records: May 2011 - Toshiba acquired Landis+Gyr for $2.3bn (ASIAMONEY Japan Best M&A 2011) Oct 2011 - Bain Capital acquired Skylark for $2.1bn