Japan's top business lobby wants to see 100 unicorns by 2027

Mar 12, 2022 | News On Japan

Mar 12, 2022 (Nikkei) - The Japan Business Federation, or Keidanren, aims for the country to become home to 100 unlisted startups worth $1 billion or more by 2027 under new recommendations to the government announced Friday.

Japan now has around 10 of these so-called unicorns. Successful startups are helping to build a positive cycle of economic growth overseas, said Tomoko Namba, a Keidanren vice chair.

"Europe was very conservative until about five years ago, but it changed very quickly," said Namba, the founder and executive chairman of online services provider DeNA, at a news conference.

"We in Japan need to have the sense of urgency that this is our last chance," she said.

Keidanren aims for the country to have 100,000 startups overall. Its new recommendations urge the government to streamline the process of creating new businesses and to lower barriers for startups to bid on government contracts.

The business lobby calls for forming a new government agency as the command center for startup-related policies. It criticizes the current approach, with responsibilities split among multiple agencies, as making it difficult to advance a coherent strategy.

Source: テレ東BIZ

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