Willis Wee · · 2 min readJapan’s BASE raises $3 million from Global Brain, eyes overseas expansion
The BASE team.
Tokyo-based startup BASE *, a company that aims to help users to create an ecommerce website within 30 seconds has raised $3 million from Global Brain. Founded in December 2012 by Yuta Tsuruoka and Kazuma Ieiri, BASE is similar to Shopify except that it is free. It is currently powering over 80,000 online shops in Japan.
Kosuke Okubo, a representative of BASE confirms that the startup does not plan to charge users this year. “In 2015, we may start charging users for our extension apps and more,” says Okubo.
With money in the bank, BASE plans to hire and invest in its engineering, support, and PR teams. It also plans to bring its e-commerce solution overseas, targeting at English-speaking Asian countries and North America.
The financing news is also accompanied by a key hire announcement. Okubo tells Tech in Asia that Hiroto Shin, a former president of GMO Pepabo’s Fukuoka branch office is joining BASE as COO. Hiroto is one of the co-founders of GMO Pepabo who started Colorme, an online e-commerce platform.
See: This entrepreneur built a startup to solve his mom’s problem
Prior to this financing round, BASE has previously raised $2.73 million from PartyFactory, CyberAgent Ventures, Suneight, and East Ventures. The BASE team currently has 18 members.
* Disclosure: East Ventures is an investor at BASE and Tech in Asia. Please see our ethics page for more information.
Editing by J.T. Quigley
(And yes, we’re serious about ethics and transparency. More information here.)
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