Casting the spotlight on Tech in Asia Tokyo 2015’s stage interviewers

Over the previous few months, you’ve heard plenty about our guest speakers. Today, we’ll be inviting onstage some of the folks who make our main stage go from great to amazing – the on-stage moderators and interviewers! For the first time in Tech in Asia history, we’ve packed our interviewer line-up with industry stars to engage our speakers on what’s shaking up the tech scene.

Hiro Maeda – Advisor to Beenos

Hiro Maeda will be interviewing Ben Horowitz, founder and partner of VC firm Andreessen Horowitz, in a special fireside chat on the second day of the conference. No stranger to the tech world himself, Hiro is currently an early stage investor and an advisor to Beenos – a startup studio and venture investment program based in Tokyo.

A man of many hats, Hiro is an entrepreneur and a visionary. With a huge dose of faith and a can-do attitude he founded two of Japan’s most successful incubators. After the Lehman crisis, when no one was keen to invest in startups in Japan, Hiro stemmed the tide and co-founded his first accelerator, Open Network Lab. Not long after, he founded and led the investment division at Beenos.

Hiro has invested in over 40 companies and was named as one of the Leaders of Tomorrow at the 2011 St. Gallen Symposium. With his eclectic background and experience in startup investments, we’re positive his interview with Ben Horowitz will be a major conference highlight.

Fireside Chat: The Hard Thing about Hard Things

Daisuke Sasaki – CEO and Co-Founder at Freee

Daisuke “Dice” Sasaki, is co-founder and CEO of Freee, best known for disrupting the way small companies do their accounting. He will be hosting the fireside chat with Ken Suzuki, founder of SmartNews – an award-winning mobile news app from Japan. Just like his interviewee, Ken, ex-Googler Dice has successfully scaled his product to the market leader it is today. Freee recently secured a further $28.7Min funding. But perhaps, the more binding common denominator between the two entrepreneurs would be their shared passion in creating a great product for users – even if they did have divergent paths whilst achieving their goal.

Dice will take us through Ken’s route to his eventual success, and the exciting future before him.

Fireside Chat: Second Time is the Charm: How Failure Fueled Smartnews’ Rise to the Top (JP)

Edith Yeung – Partner at 500 Mobile Collective Fund
Edith Yeung is a partner at 500 Mobile Collective Fund, focusing on investing in mobile apps and consumer internet startups. Prior to her current role, Edith was VP of marketing and business development for Dolphin Browser, a Sequoia-backed mobile browser, and also co-founder of angel investment firm RightVentures, where she invested in over 20 startups.

A global citizen, Edith originally hails from Hong Kong but is now based in the US. In between the two, she spent a significant amount of her time in China. Edith is also a frequent traveler, and has logged close to a million air miles. Working in the mobile domain has immensely heightened the importance of cross-border collaboration for her, given the vastly different pain points that varies from market to market.

Join Edith as she paves the way for us to take an inside look at how Bertrand Schmitt defied all odds to catapult mobile app analytics service App Annie to its success today.

Fireside Chat: Chinese Launchpad: How App Annie Took Flight From Beijing (EN)
Minoru Imano – Partner and Chief Operating Officer at Globis Capital Partners

Minoru Imano will join Metaps founder and CEO Katsuaki Sato on stage to give us a look into the company at a time when it has just gone public and become a force to be reckoned within the payments, machine learning, and deep space verticals. Minoru is the COO of Globis Capital Partners, one of Japan’s most widely respected venture capital firms. Currently leading a team in the IT sector, Minoru has time and again proven his knack for understanding online trends and the companies which can capitalize on them. His session with Katsuaki Sato promises an insightful take for anyone keen to hear about the makings of a successful startup particularly in information technology.

Fireside Chat: A Conversation with Katsuaki Sato (JP)

Also joining us on the main stage as interviewers/moderators, we have:

Akio Tanaka, Co-Founder & Managing Partner at Infinity Venture Partners in The Panel without Fear (JP)

Anis Uzzaman, General Partner & CEO at Fenox Venture Capital in IoT in Japan: is the Future Now? (JP)

Vinnie Lauria, ‎Managing Partner at Golden Gate Ventures in How to Enter and Win in Southeast Asia (EN)

On the Kickstart stage, we have:

Yoshihiko Kinoshita, Managing director of Skyland Ventures in How to Startup Outside of Tokyo (JP)

Nik Pasevic, Facilitator at Pioneers in Communities with Traction: How to Create Fans and Ambassadors (EN)

Brandon K. Hill, Founder at btrax in the Winning Formula for Us – Japan Hybrid Companies (EN)

It’s not too late to catch our excellent interviewers, moderators and speakers at Tech in Asia Tokyo. Get your passes now!