Velodash Japan Inc. offers business support in Japan and Taiwan in domains such as cross-border e-comm, PR for Japan-bound tourism, new market entries, and cross-regional interaction. Daiki Sekiguchi, the CEO of Velodash Japan, hopes these efforts will generate sustainable growth in both countries and regions.
Please tell us about Velodash Japan’s services.
We provide cross-border e-comm support, mainly for businesses entering the Taiwanese market. We also manage PR targeted to tourists visiting Japan and assist startups hoping to enter the Japanese market.
Our strength is our collaborative operation with local teams, a network we have nurtured since our establishment. For example, to successfully market a high-quality Japanese product in another country, a Japanese company must understand local consumer needs or the best timing to launch. To develop PR strategies for our clients, we apply my experience from living in Taiwan for a long time, cooperate with local teams, and develop an in-depth understanding of our clients’ needs.
Our recent case is with Taiwan’s online shopping site, WUZ. We collaborated with them to support a major Japanese drugstore chain’s cross-border e-comm entry into the Taiwanese market. Our plan included PR across various social media platforms, inserting flyers in product packaging, and pop-up booths in physical WUZ stores in central Taipei, where consumers could handle products and access official websites through QR codes. We achieved high engagement rates by narrowing the target to women interested in Japanese cosmetics in the upper-middle segment.
Regarding Japan’s inbound tourism PR, we work with local influencers to generate cost-effective exposure.
While Taiwan and Japan have different business practices, we believe our extensive local knowledge enables us to connect businesses in a way that satisfies all parties.
What other services do you offer?
Wakayama City has deep ties with Taiwan. There, we designed tours for municipal officials of Taipei and Wakayama City to visit each other, arranged interpreters, and spoke at events for regional interaction.
Our efforts, intended to foster interactions between Japan and Taiwan, take various forms. These include bringing Japanese art to the Taiwanese market, PR targeted to tourists visiting Japan, supporting Taiwanese startups, and writing articles for newspapers and informatory magazines.
Japan’s traditional culture and cuisine are unique, but Japan is also a massive engineering powerhouse. At the same time, the Japanese have a distinct sensibility when it comes to hosting guests and socializing with others. With our efforts to widely communicate Japan’s fascinating appeal, we would like to go beyond Taiwan to other ASEAN nations and the rest of the world one day.
What made you start a business like this?
After I graduated college in Japan, I went on to study at a university in Taiwan. In a truly international environment, I was able to hone my linguistic skills and capacity for intercultural understanding while studying for my degree. During this time, I volunteered for an event at a local commercial area in Wakayama City called “Wakayama Night Market.” There, I could see first-hand the challenges Japan’s provincial cities faced, as well as their love for their hometown.
With a renewed sense of alarm regarding Japan’s economic and social issues, such as its declining birthrate, aging population, and depopulation of rural areas, I realized that obtaining foreign currencies from abroad was necessary for the sustainable growth of Japan and its regions. That is why I entered a community of startups while still at university and began to prepare seriously for my own.
Sadly, I’m sure Japan will see further drops in population and birthrate as the aging population and regional disparities continue to expand. For sustainable growth, we need to build relationships that merit all of our partner countries instead of only considering our needs. I want to work with the world to develop a brighter society.