CONNECTING
JAPAN &THE NORDICS
Newsletter #16
August 31, 2021

UPDATES FROM INNOVATION LAB ASIA
The Nordic Urbantech Report

Last month, Innovation Lab Asia (ILA) launched its 3rd sector report introducing the Nordic
Urbantech ecosystem and 25 startups curated to a Japanese audience. The report is produced incollaboration with Copenhagen Capacity, TechBBQ, Asia House Denmark, BLOXHUB, Urbantech
Accelerator, The Danish Industry Foundation, and several community organisations across theNordic region.
The report outlines the Nordic Urbantech landscape, including an overview of Nordic urbantechand Smart City Hubs. Additionally, showcasing 25 outstanding Nordic startups, their solutions
and ambitions towards Asia and Japan. The report is published in both Japanese and English andfreely available on our publications page together with our other sector reports.
The report was launched at an all-Japanese event together with Nordic Innovation House Tokyoand JETRO, which is described below in the next section.
The Nordic Urbantech report will similarly to our other sector reports be updated with newstartup profiles over time. We hope this report will inspire and foster further cooperation between
the Nordic and Asian startup ecosystems.

Now is the Season! Why you should consider the Nordicecosystem

On the 30th of June, Oliver Hall and Julian Nielsen from our team together with Intralink Group andNordic Ninja VC co-organised the all-Japanese event, “Now is the Season! Why you should consider
the Nordic ecosystem”.
Oliver and Julian outlined why the Nordics is such a digitised region and about the boom ofJapanese investments to Nordic startups, followed by Tomosaku Sohara From Nordic Ninja VC,
elaborating on the experience of working with Japanese LP’s and investing in Nordic deeptech
startups.
Also, we had the pleasure of having 9 great Nordic startups, Walk With Path, Neurescue, CEREBRIU,Popit, Greater Than, Pie Systems, DigiShares, Catenda, ZOAN representing the healthtech, fintech
and urbantech verticals, pitch to Japanese investors and stakeholders at the webinar.
The event and the content of the speaks is outlined in this article on the Japanese outlet Techable,
by Yuri Sato. Check out the article here.

5th Open Innovation Seminar: The characteristics of theNordic ecosystem and the latest trends of urbantech startups!

Last month, the 6th of July, Julian and Oliver did another all-Japanese event along with theFinnish mobility startup Sensible4, this time for JETRO’s 5th Open Innovation Seminar about theNordic ecosystem.
The purpose of the event was to provide Japanese companies interested in collaboratingwith Nordic startups advice on how to build relationships and engage in collaborative projects
together. The event was also used to launch our newest sector report, The Nordic Urbantech
Report, to the audience of more than 215 Japanese stakeholders from various public institutions,companies, and startups.
Read more about the content, events and the presentations from ILA, Nordic Innovation House
Tokyo and the Finnish startup Sensible4, which is reviewed and outlined in this JETRO article.

Upcoming Activities
Lessons Learnt Report
The ILA-team is presently working on a Lessons Learnt report that will provide an extract of
the insights generated by ILA. During the last three years we have gathered a vast amount of
information for anyone interested in connecting with startup communities in Asia.
We’ve experienced both failure and success, witnessed the complexity of Asia, and seen newtrends emerge as we moved along. We have gathered specific insights on how, where andwhy to engage with Asian ecosystems, seen first-hand the limitations that hamper Danishinternationalization towards Asia and identified measures that could streamline the process.
This also includes a viable model to strengthen the collaboration between the Nordic and Japanese
ecosystems.
If you are interested in learning more about how to foster further collaboration between Nordic andAsian ecosystems, follow our LinkedIn page for more information about the report which will belaunched in the beginning of September.

TechBBQ Summit 2021
This year the TechBBQ Summit will be held on September the 16-17th of September, in a hybrid
online / offline format, but with a capacity of more than 2000 people from the physical part.
While the final program for the Summit will be presented in the first week of September, ILA will
be coordinating several activities!
The ILA team will be present at the Summit with our own booth, presenting our future initiaitives,
facilitating roundtable discussions for Nordic investors interested in Asian and Japanesemarkets, and organize a social network gathering in the evening. The latter will include drinks
and food at an external venue to gather Nordic stakeholders interested in Japan and Asia.
Follow our LinkedIn channel, where we will soon present the schedule for our activities during theSummit.
* The networking event will be external to the TechBBQ program, so it is still possible toparticipate without a ticket.

SHORT NEWS FROM THE NORDICSFI

The autonomous driving software startup Sensible4 has announced a partnershipwith Panasonic Industries to research and test new sensors for autonomous driving.

DKPleo, who provides a smart spending solution for businesses has raised EUR 128
million at a EUR 1.45 billion valuation, making them Demark’s 8th unicorn, fasterthan any other Danish company, taking just over six years.

DKThe challenger bank Lunar has raised EUR 210 million in a Series D funding. With
this round of funding, the company has achieved unicorn status.

FI

FLEXOUND, an augmented audio technology startup joins forces with the Japanese cinema company United Cinemas, to introduce the world’s first loudspeaker-free cinema sound and seat system.

DK

Cerebriu, who is developing AI software to analyse MRI brain images, has received
EUR 524.400 from Innovationsfonden. The company aims to raise EUR 10 million
next year.

SWE

Electric vehicle startup Einride is partnering with Bridgestone, who will be exclusively supplying smart-sensing tires for Einride’s battery powered trucks in theUnited States.

NOGelato, an on-demand printing platform raises EUR 205 million reaching unicornstatus. The funding round was led by global private equity and VC firm Insight Partners.

INTERVIEW WITH SHIBUYA STARTUP SUPPORT

Please tell us a little about Tiimo.
I co-founded Tiimo in 2015. At Tiimo we are ona mission to make life less chaotic and the world
more neuro inclusive. Our popular visual dailyplanning app helps people get the important
things done and build routines that work forthem by leveraging the fact that visual information is considerably more effective than writteninformation. Our app has been designed to beinclusive for people who are neurodivergent,
including people with ADHD and/or autism, bysupporting executive function challenges likeplanning, time management, memory and focus. As one user expresses, Tiimo is like “gettingglasses for time blindness”. While it might soundsimple, Tiimo has proven to be life changing forour more than 25,000 subscribers across theworld. But we are just getting started! Tiimo
can also be used by anyone who is seeking avisual way to manage their daily routines and it
is currently available via app stores in over 85
countries.
Recently, you have launched the Tiimo appin Japanese. Why is the Japanese market
interesting for Tiimo?
We have always been fascinated by Japan andits culture. Since the initial launch of Tiimo, twoJapanese tech-magazines (Techable, EASIER)
have written reviews about our app and how
it can provide support for people with ADHD orautism. We saw that there was interest from Japan and decided to launch in Japan, as the firstmarket in Asia.

Name:		

Helene Lassen Nørlem

Position: 		CEO & Co-Founder

Organisation:		

Tiimo

Ecosystem location:

Denmark, Copenhagen

Contact:

hln@tiimo.dk

What gains have you seen/do you foreseefrom increased interaction between theJapanese and Nordic innovation ecosystems?
I find it interesting that the two regions perceive
time differently, which is interesting for the design of Tiimo in terms of how we can adapt andimprove the app for users in different workingcultures. Another aspect is that we have a common goal of creating a neuro-inclusive society.
We are looking to learn and get more insightsfrom Japan both for future development of theTiimo app but also the company.
What do you think are the main barriers forTiimo to enter the Japanese market?
We have just launched the app in the Japanese
App Stores, currently only promoted via Apple’sApp Store. There is a lot to learn and explore in
the market, especially finding the right mentors
and partners, and reaching out to local influencers who can promote the app.
What type of Japanese stakeholders would
you like to reach out to?
We are planning to raise another round of funding later this year. And so, we are looking for
new investors to join the journey and help us increating a more neuro inclusive world.

EVENT

BULLETIN BOARD
EVENT

August 30th - Nordic Startup Ecosystem - Go Global World will be hostingthe“Nordic Startup Ecosystem” webinar. Join Lisa Mallner, our Ecosystem
Advisor and AI Investment Manager at Copenhagen Capacity, who will
speak about trends, key initiatives, and insights into how to enter and be
successful in the Nordic market. This webinar will be held in English.
Check out the event and sign up: here

EVENT

August 31st - Smart cities in the Nordic countries - Human-centred
approaches and regional integration - A new webinar from the Smart
City Institute Japan’s webinar series “Smart City 101”, this time shining aspotlight on the Nordic smart cities. Join our friends from Nordic Innovation
House Tokyo, who will also be speaking at this event. This webinar will beheld in Japanese.
Check out the event and sign up: hereEVENT

16-17th September - TechBBQ 2021 - the 2nd largest Scandinavian tech
Summit after SLUSH is back, and this time most of it is held physically!
Come to Copenhagen, Denmark, for two awesome days bringing together
the entire Nordic ecosystem. This year’s program offers startup pitches
by ambitious startups, world-class stage content, golden networking
opportunities and hygge! The hybrid event will feature both content online
and offline, including access to the Brella platform for setting up shortnetworking meetings. Come join Innovation Lab Asia at the Summit, where
we will also be coordinating several activities!
Check out the event and find your tickets here.

EDITORSPeter Johansen
Project Manager
pj@asia-house.dk
Julian Morié Hara Nielsen
Japanese Consultant
jni@techbbq.org

Innovation Lab Asia is a project collaboration
between Asia House and TechBBQ funded by
the Danish Industry Foundation.
For more information:

OUR REPORTS

Find all our reports here

Asia House|Indiakaj 16, Copenhagen|www.innovationlabasia.dk|

hello@innovationlabasia.dk