Current status of startup finance in Japan

Monday, February 12, 2018
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
(Pacific)
Philippines Conference Room
Encina Hall, Third Floor, Central, C330
616 Jane Stanford Way, Stanford, CA 94305

Confronting a declining population and increased aging, the government of Japan currently implements measures for Regional Revitalization (chiho sosei), a policy to vitalize local economies by shaping “a social framework more amenable to bearing and raising children.” One of the most important policy issues to shape such a framework is to secure employment opportunities in regional economies, and establishment of new firms, or startups, plays a significant role in providing new employment opportunities.

For the success of startups, money (fund raising) is the chief obstacle because startups are rarely creditworthy and have significant asymmetry of information on its repayment ability with lenders. Such firms have difficulty in raising funds, or financial constraint, and cannot help but depend on internal funds from their CEOs or families. Whether and to what extent do startups confront with financial constraint? How does finance matter for the performance of startups? And first of all, how do various types of startups raise funds?

To answer these questions, Uchida currently leads a research project on startup finance in Japan with support from a large-scale research grant in Japan (JSPS Kakenhi). In this seminar, he reports findings from this ongoing project. He presents an overview of, and some empirical results on, the current statu of startups firms and startup finance in Japan using publicly available data and data from original surveys that his research team has conducted. He also provides some findings from international comparisons with findings from the U.S., which he currently undertakes as a visiting scholar at APARC (with support from Abe Fellowship).

 

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hirofumi uchida   rsd17 080 0070a copy
Hirofumi Uchida joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) during the 2017-2018 academic year from the Kobe University’s Graduate School of Business Administration where he serves as a professor of Banking and Finance.

Uchida’s research interests focus on banking, financial institutions, and financial system architecture. During his stay at Shorenstein APARC, Uchida will conduct research on startup finance in the U.S. from the perspective of an international comparison with Japan. For this research, he receives Abe Fellowship (Social Science Research Council).

Uchida's research has been published in International Economic Review, Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Journal of Financial Intermediation, Economica, and Journal of Banking and Finance, among others. He is also an associate editor of Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking, and a member of the Study Group for Earthquake and Enterprise Dynamics (SEEDs) and the Money & Finance Research Group (MoFiR). 

Uchida received his M.A. in Economics in 1995 and his Ph.D. in Economics in 1999, both from Osaka University. Prior to joining Kobe University in 2009, Uchida was with the Kyoto Institute for Economic Research at Kyoto University, and the Faculty of Economics at Wakayama University. He was also a visiting scholar at the Kelley School of Business, Indiana University as a 2003 Fulbright Scholar.