Dropbox surpasses 10M Japanese users, inks biz cloud deal with SoftBank

Dropbox co-founder and CEO Drew Houston (left) with Japan Country Manager Hiroaki Kawamura.

Dropbox co-founder and CEO Drew Houston was in Tokyo this morning to announce the firm’s partnership with SoftBank Commerce and Service (SoftBank C&S). Speaking at the New Economy Summit, Houston also announced that Dropbox has surpassed 10 million Japanese users since opening a Tokyo office last October.

Houston explained that the partnership with SoftBank C&S – Japan’s largest information and communications technology distributor – aims to bring Dropbox for Business to one million Japanese users over the next five years. SoftBank C&S will also become the primary reseller and distributor for Dropbox for Business in the domestic market.

“Tokyo is one of my favorite places in the world and Japan is one of our most important markets,” Houston said. “SoftBank has a huge presence with businesses here […] and we think they will be a great partner to help us accelerate our growth.”

In addition to the partnership with SoftBank, Dropbox also revealed that it will collaborate with 13 of Japan’s most popular service providers: I-O Data Device, i3 Systems, Alps System Integration Co., Inventit Inc., Intercom Inc., International Systems Research Co., WingArc1st Inc., a2media Corporation, and Recomot Inc. Each will integrate with Dropbox for Business’ API to extend the functionality of the core service.

How does Dropbox differentiate itself from rival business cloud services? Houston chalks it up to scale.

“We have more than 300,000 applications on the Dropbox platform,” he said. “And we have over a hundred thousand companies bringing Dropbox for Business to work every day.”

Asked how Dropbox plans to acquire a million paying customers, he added:

“Japan was one of the first places, outside of the US, that really started adopting Dropbox, and Japan has always been very mobile. If [Dropbox] is a big part of your life, you tend to be more likely to pay [for it].”

DropBox for Business currently counts Japan’s leading advertising agency, Dentsu, and gaming company Alim among its paying customers.