With more and more young people wanting to start companies that use innovative ideas and research to tackle social problems, universities have begun teaching their students how to be an entrepreneur, to help nurture human resources who can revolutionize the business world.
"I might not've been able to think about starting a business myself if it wasn't for my university's support," said Shonosuke Ishiwatari, 29, looking back on the assistance and training he received from the University of Tokyo. Ishiwatari is the chief executive officer of Mantra Inc., a start-up company that provides an AI-based translation tool for manga.
The device developed by Mantra, which was established in January 2020, automatically detects dialogue and other text in manga and translates them into foreign languages, including English and Chinese. Corrections and proofreading can easily be performed as well, and some publishers and manga apps are already using the tool.
Ishiwatari researched computer analysis of words and dialogue used by people on a daily basis while he was studying at the University of Tokyo's graduate school. He was toying with the idea of becoming an academic researcher, but then he heard a lecture by an alumnus who had launched a start-up.
Ishiwatari has been a big manga fan since childhood. When he lived in China with his family, he found it was Japanese manga that attracted his friends there. At the same time, he saw many websites that carried pirated manga without the creators or publishers' permission. Ishiwatari thought that if manga could be distributed overseas more quickly, that would help solve the problem.
Manga dialogue is sometimes split into multiple parts or the subject of a sentence may be skipped, which makes it difficult for AI to correctly perceive the context and translate the texts. Given the high technical hurdles, Ishiwatari thought of a risk that he would fail if he starts the business, but "I thought it sounded like a lot of fun, and that overcame my fear," he said.
In 2018, when he was in the third year of working toward his doctorate, Ishiwatari learned how to start a business from scratch at the University of Tokyo Entrepreneur Dojo, a program for aspiring entrepreneurs offered by the university.
During the summer holiday that year, he joined the university's Summer Founders Program, in which the participants worked on developing new products and surveyed consumer needs. In 2019, Ishiwatari received 5 million yen in funding from UTokyo Innovation Platform Co. (UTokyo IPC), a venture capital firm founded by the university.
Mantra is planning to start services for individual customers who study English through manga.
"My goal is to use technology to reduce language barriers and make the world a happier place," Ishiwatari said.
-- Pioneer of entrepreneur support
The University of Tokyo has been a pioneer among Japanese universities offering entrepreneur training and support for young people starting businesses.
The Entrepreneur Dojo course was launched in fiscal 2005. It had been taken by about 4,000 students as of fiscal 2020 and produced more than 100 entrepreneurs. There is also a diverse range of operations connected to the course, such as "incubation" facilities that assist start-up companies and support programs for graduates who are thinking of starting a business. About 430 new business ventures have emerged from the university's efforts.
The top five companies have a joint market capitalization of about 1.4 trillion yen, and include pharmaceutical company PeptiDream Inc. and information technology service company mixi, Inc.
"In keeping with changes in the structure of the business world and the employment situation, starting a business is becoming an option for University of Tokyo students," said Prof. Shigeo Kagami of the university's graduate school of engineering. Kagami also serves as a deputy director general of the University of Tokyo's Division of University Corporate Relations.
"As the number of graduates who become successful entrepreneurs increases, there will be a virtuous cycle in which students who have seen them succeed will aspire to start a business themselves," he said.
-- Government pitches in
To help university research findings contribute to the creation of new industries, the government has proactively supported business ventures coming from universities.
According to a survey in fiscal 2020 by the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, the number of start-up companies that originated in universities increased 339 from the previous fiscal year to 2,905. Both figures were new all-time highs.
Still, only a fraction can significantly expand their operations. One problem that has been cited is insufficient human resources who can handle corporate management.
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