Top Food Tech Startups in Japan

Japan is known for its beautiful cuisine and advancing technology. Japan’s food culture is considered to be eloquent. But due to the fast life, people want to have more healthy food. So to have a wholesome lifestyle, the startups are making the use of technology in the food sector of Japan. Some startups are trying to produce healthy meals. While others are creating easier options for ordering food or booking a table. With these ideas, Japan is moving towards a sustainable and healthy lifestyle. Here are some of the top food technology startups in Japan.

Gochikuru

 

 

 

 

 

Gochikuru is a food delivery company owned by “Star Festival”. The company enables people to look up different restaurants and menus and order food at a pre-decided time. This helps people to save a lot of time. The company recently partnered up with Askul. Askul has decided to add Gochikuru to its line up of services.

Raised to date: $40Mn

Founded: 2009, Tokyo

Investors: JAFCO, ASKUL, Globis Capital Partners, GREE Ventures, Pegasus Tech Ventures

Okan

 

 

 

 

 

Okan is a food delivery company servicing corporate customers. The company offers meals that could be refrigerated. The employees could heat the food as per their convenience. The company has its own refrigerator box that could be installed in the office. The box comes with a charger. Thus, allowing people to arrange the food at their ease.

Raised to date: $6.28Mn

Founded: 2012, Tokyo

Investors: 31Ventures, C-Mobile, CyberAgent Capital, Global Brain, Mizuho Capital Partners, Oisix ra daichi, Rakuten Capital, SMBC Venture Capital, YJ Capital

Toreta

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Toreta is an app which aids the restaurants to manage reservations. The company lets restaurants create a website where people can make reservations. This is suitable for people as it will remove the hassle of calling. Consequently, it becomes convenient for restaurants to interact with customers for reservations. 

Founded: 2013, Tokyo

Investors: Eight Roads, Femto Capital, Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Company, MS&AD Ventures, NTT Docomo Ventures

DAIZ

 

 

 

 

 

DAIZ focuses on using germinated Banksoybean meat as a replacement of meat in the meals. They mainly research, produce and sell the material that looks like meat. This substance that looks like meat is created from germinated soybeans. The soybean is considered high in protein and rich in vitamins and minerals.

Raised to date: $11.17Mn

Founded: Kumamoto

Investors: A-Five, Fruit Hall, Kagoshima Bank, Kuredo, Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, Nichirei, Okasan Capital Partners, QB Capital

Retty

 

 

 

 

 

Retty is a social gourmet website where people can note down the list of restaurants they wish to visit. The users can also share their experiences regarding the restaurants that they have visited. People can decide to choose a restaurant based on the theme of the restaurant. They can also search for the area, type of cuisine and the number of people that would be eating.

Raised to date: $23.58Mn

Founded: 2010, Tokyo

Investors: ABC Dream Ventures, WiL, Eight Roads, ITOCHU Technology Ventures, Mizuho Capital partners

Table Check

 

 

 

 

 

Table Check is an online website to make reservations at the restaurant. The company also offers services such as pickup and delivery from nearby restaurants. The website also has an application. Their data integration and analytics feature help the restaurateurs to keep a track of their overall business.

Raised to date: $9.44Mn

Founded: 2011, Tokyo

Investors: Benefit One, DNX Ventures, SMBC Venture Capital, JAFCO, Nobuyuki Idei

Favy

 

 

 

 

 

Favy is a website for promoting the food market and focuses on gourmet cuisine. The website’s blogs are related to the current trends in the food market such as top restaurants in a particular area, restaurants that are well known for a particular dish. People can easily make decisions based on their requirements due to the platform.

Raised to date: NA

Found: 2015, Tokyo

Investors: Mynavi, CyberAgent Capital, DNX Ventures, Energy and Environment Investment, Mizuho Capital partners

Delish Kitchen

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Delish Kitchen is a media-focused startup that consists of different food recipe videos. The company owns a mobile application which is available on iOS and Android. This can be useful for people who wish to learn and try different recipes. 

Raised to date NA

Founded: 2015, Chiba 

Investors: NA

Integriculture

Integriculture uses cellular agriculture for production. Cellular Agriculture means producing agricultural products from cells that are grown in an under observation environment. It is a B2B company. The company’s partners could produce their own meat due to Integriculture’s technology. It offers better sustainability and reduces health issues. 

Raised to date: $10.2Mn

Founded: 2015, Tokyo

Investors: AgFunder, Hiroshima Venture Capital, Naruhisa Nakagawa, Nippon Meat Packers, VU Venture Partners, Realtech Fund, Next Ventures, A-Five

Miil 

 

 

 

 

 

Miil is an application that allows people to share their food experience via posting of pictures. People can upload pictures of food that they wish to eat. This can bring different restaurants under the light. Apart from owning a mobile application, the company also has other businesses of food curation marketing and gourmet ranking app.

Founded: 2011, Tokyo

Investors: SunBridge Global Ventures, Tetsuro Oshita, Dentsu Innovation Partners, Lead Capital Management, CyberAgent Capital

KitchHike

 

 

 

 

 

KitchHike is a website that ties locals with international cooks or guests to give them a taste of the home-cooked meal. The website can further be used to travel to neighbouring countries to experience their food cultures. This website provides users to enjoy different food cultures. 

Raised to date: $4.24Mn

Founded: 2012, Kangawa

Investors: MTG Ventures, OPENSAUCE Co. Ltd, Freebank Capital, Mercari, Mistletoe, Venture United

Nosh 

 

 

 

 

 

Nosh is a food delivery website. The platform cook food according to people’s dietary needs. The food that is delivered would be frozen. Thus, the customers can heat the food as per their ease. Due to the dietary requirements, people can have a proper meal. Anyone with any dietary restrictions can thus make changes to the meal.

Raised to date: $7.01Mn

Founded: 2016, Osaka

Investors: Hiroshima Venture Capital, House Food Group Innovation Fund, Mynavi, Nissay Capital, SMBC Venture Capital

Planet Table

   

 

 

Plant Table is an online platform whose purpose is to resolve issues such as food wastage by using big data. The company connects farmers and restaurants to clear up this issue. Another company called Send provides a network to connect to the farmers for great quality produce. Due to the reduction in the wastage, the supply automatically increases. 

Raised to date: $4.38Mn

Founded: 2014, Tokyo

Investors: CyberAgent Capital, D4V (Design for Ventures), Genuine Startups, House Foods Group, Mistletoe, Saison Ventures, SBI Investment

GINKAN

 

 

 

 

 

 

GINKAN’s SynchroLife is a restaurant marketing application. The company uses blockchain technology and tokens. The tokens are used as a basis of payment. The company expects that the token system will change the payment system. It also allows users to earn reward points for discovering quality restaurants.

Raised to date: $3.6Mn

Founded: 2015, Tokyo

Investors: Ceres (Media and Information Services), DD Holdings Open Innovation Fund, Fujio Komura, Giftee, GRASSHOPPER (DENTSU run accelerator program), Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, MTG Ventures, MUFG Digital Accelerator, Oak Fan, Orient (Tokyo), Plug and Play Tech Center, Sansei Capital Investment

Oishi Kenko

 

Oishi Kenko provides food recipe search which is meant to be tasty and healthy. The company offers two services such as delicious health and living book. Delicious health is used for recipe search managed by dieticians. Living book focuses on cooking videos. The website includes videos and blogs revolving around a healthy lifestyle.

Raised to date: $3.55Mn

Founded: 2016, Japan

Investors: Aflac Ventures, Dai-Ichi Life Insurance

AIVICK

 

 

 

 

 

AIVICK is a company which has created a food tech-based application. They focus on helping every person’s health through food suggestions. The company provides food as per the individual nutritional requirements. In 2017, the company had partnered up with Panasonic Corporation for its technology.

Raised to date: $2.77Mn

Founded: 2005, Kyoto

Investors: DEFTA Partners, Kyoshin Innovation C Investment, Mission Capital

Office de Yasai

 

 

 

 

 

Office de yasai, an online website delivers fresh fruits and vegetables to the office. The office staff can get their fruits and salads delivered to them on demand. The fresh salads and fruits can be consumed by the employees anytime they want. The company also offers rice meals. The rice meals come with a side dish.

Raised to date: $1.77Mn

Founded: 2012, Tokyo

Investors: Hiroshima Venture Capital, Incubate Fund, iSGS Investment Works, Kewpie, Kiyohiro Sugashita, Masaru Tange, Nissay Capital, NOS Ventures, Samurai Incubate, Shizuoka Capital, Tsuneishi Capital Partners

Base Food

 

 

 

 

 

 

Base Food is a company working towards creating healthy staple food. They currently have two products Base Bread and Base Pasta. The two products are meant to be nutritious and easy to cook. The past could be cooked with different types of sauces. The bread is ready to be eaten anytime. The company plans to have an improved food lifestyle. 

Raised to date: NA

Founded: 2016,

Investors: Rakuten Capital, XTech Ventures, Global Brain, Rakuten Capital, XTech Ventures  

Bright Table

 

 

 

 

 

Bright Table a food tech company has developed an application which automates the reservation process. The application books the table on behalf of the user by asking the user for the details such as the name of the restaurant, time and number of people.

Raised to date: $0.91Mn

Founded: 2012, Japan

Investors: Accord Ventures, AG Capital (Tokyo), DAS Capital, Genesia Ventures, Incubate Fund

X Kitchen

 

 

 

 

X Kitchen brings all the small restaurant brands under a centralized kitchen. This helps the small restaurants to function under lower cost. The restaurants also receive attention. Therefore, they can also deliver the food to multiple locations with ease due to one centralized kitchen. This will make it simple for the service provider and the customer.

Raised to date: $0.46Mn

Founded: 2019, Tokyo

Investors: Skyland Ventures, Inc.

Open Source Food

 

 

 

 

 

Open Source Food is a website where people can share their recipes. The website can give space for food innovators to share their recipes. Also, people can rate these recipes. The ratings can help the users to choose the recipes quickly.

Raised to date: $0.01Mn

Founded: 2007, Tokyo

Investors: NA

Cloudmeal.io

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cloudmeal.io is an online food delivery service for office employees. The platform is connected to various restaurants to help the employees to choose their meals. The employees get to select from a range of meals. The company acts as good as a cafeteria. It also offers a monthly subscription.

Raised to date: NA

Founded: 2011, Tokyo

Investors: Incubate Fund

Menew

 

 

 

 

 

The Menew application assists the homeowners to decide the meals. Their Artificial Intelligence (AI) creates a weekly menu for the family.  This application removes the dilemma of what to cook daily. Additionally, the application takes into consideration the nutritional requirements mentioned by the users.

Raised to date: NA

Founded: 2012, Okayama

Investors: NTT Docomo Ventures, TEPCO Frontier Partners

StartOuts

 

 

 

 

 

Startouts is a food-tech startup focusing on cooking videos. The platform lets people watch various recipe videos and tutorials. This will help the users to learn at their own pace with simplicity. 

Raised to date: NA

Founded: 2013. Tokyo

Former Investors: Adways, East Ventures, Energy & Environment Investment, Mizuho Venture Capital, Shintaro Yamada