Fuji Startup Ventures established as JPY1.5B fund for integrating apps and technology into TV programs

Japan’s Fuji TV has setup a 1.5 billion yen fund to invest in startups that develop applications and services that have potential in being integrated into TV programming.

Nikkei reports that the new venture capital fund (about US$17 million) aims to create business synergies between these startups and the many subsidiaries and businesses that Fuji TV runs, including radio stations, the recording business and mail-order shopping.

Television is not exactly a new frontier for startups, with brands, developers and established companies trying to find the right marriage between traditional TV and Internet and mobile-based offerings. Recently, U.S.-based social-TV startup Kwarter raised US$4 million to develop second-screen applications for brands and businesses, for instance. In the Asia Pacific region, though, partnerships look more toward content development and distribution of existing programming through IP-based technologies, such as streaming media and mobile devices.

Fuji TV’s setting up of a fund is timely, with today’s younger generations eschewing televiewing in favor of reading and watching content on mobile devices. Television viewership is already on the decline says a comScore study, as consumers now favor on-demand programming and mobile content.

via Tech in Asia

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Check Out 3 Years of Stunning 3G Growth in China [CHART]

China has just reached 233.44 million 3G subscribers across its three mobile telcos. Digging back through the self-reported stats for each, I noticed that the end of 2009 is the earliest firm data point for all companies involved, so let’s take a look at three years of stunning 3G growth in China. The newest numbers for 2012 Q4 show that China Mobile (NYSE:CHL; HKG:0941) is up to 87.93 million on its 3G network, closely followed by China Unicom (NYSE:CHU; HKG:0762) with 76.46 million, and China Telecom (NYSE:CHA; HKG:0728) with 69.05 million. It’s all quite equal (see graph below), and growing at a steady rate. It’s interesting that the iPhone is not visible as a bump in the charts, but instead it seems to have contributed to the strength of China Unicom (which is actually the country’s smallest mobile telco by overall subscriber numbers) in the long run, allowing it to punch above its weight and closely tail China Mobile in the 3G market. Or perhaps that’s just down to China Unicom’s very common W-CDMA 3G network, which gives its users access to most of the hottest smartphones out there. In stark contrast, China Mobile’s homegrown TD-SCDMA standard doesn’t support any Apple devices, and relies on handset makers agreeing to make a TD-SCDMA device for the world’s biggest telco. Many big brands like HTC and Motorola have done that; Apple obviously hasn’t. Many analysts are awaiting 4G hitting China. But that’s very unlikely to happen nationwide this year, as a series of city tests continue apace. 2014 is more likely for that. And so by this time next year, it’s conceivable that there’ll be half a million on 3G. Here’s how it has panned out in the past few years [1] in our chart: The only figures missing are China Telecom’s stats for 2010 Q1, Q2, and Q3. So those have been calculated as growing progressively from the telco’s self-reported 2009 Q4 to 2010 Q4 numbers.  ↩

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Google Transparency Report : India takes the #2 spot

Google has released updated Transparency Report data for second half of 2012 and India stands at #2 with 2,431 requests (US tops the chart with 8,438 requests).

There were 2,432 data requests and 4,106 users/account data that Indian government asked for and Google complied to 66% of these requests. Important to note that this data doesn’t include request for content removal and that will be released separately.

India topped the chart for content removal request for the period July to December 2011 and given that government has now woken up to social media, expect more of this in the coming days.

Recommended Read :

- Congress Congress finally recognizes the power of social media. To spend Rs 100 crores?

- Congress wants Key members to submit Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and social media credentials to the party

Related posts:

1. India climbs to #2 position in Google Transparency Report [Big Brother]
2. Google Transparency Report shows Indian government’s ever growing desire to ‘control’ the web
3. Twitter releases first transparency report, 5k tweets deleted this year over copyright row

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[Philippines] DevCon + iSTART@PH

DevCon + iSTART@PH

This FREE event is open to members of tech user groups and startups. There will be pizza/brew and you’ll get to network with members of 10 Singaporean companies who are joining us.

iSTART @ Philippines is a Singapore government initiative to bring Singaporean startups to the Philippines. It’s a two-week trip (Jan 28 – Feb 8) bringing a number of Singaporean startups and investors to Manila. They are meeting the movers and shakers in our tech/startup scene.

Event details:

• Start: Tuesday, 29 January, 2013 07:00 p.m.
• End: Tuesday, 29 January, 2013 10:00 p.m.
• Venue : TechBar, 5F Orient Square Bldg, F. Ortigas Jr. Road, Ortigas Center, Pasig City
• Register here
• Organizer : Developers Connect Philippines (DevCon)

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[Event] Calling out all aspiring developers, the inaugural Plugfest Competition wants you

Inspired by the reality TV show “The Voice”, the inaugural Plugfest International Programming Competition (IPC) is calling out to all tertiary students and individuals to compete against each other by thinking out of the box and creating complete web applications using publicly available datasets from the Singapore Government through data.gov.sg

The competition, which is initiated by the Google Developer Group (GDG) Singapore and IEEE Computer Society Singapore will also be a good platform for participants to receive valuable coaching from experienced, Information and communications technology (ICT) mentors to help them work through their app creation process.

“The rationale behind the competition is to motivate both budding and established software developers to build scalable web apps that work on mobile devices. With access to data from the Singapore Government, we look forward to the interest apps and projects that come up.” says Dr Krishnan SPT, co-founder of the Google Developer Group Singapore.

The competition would be divided into two categories: PlugFest IHL for undergraduate students studying at any Institute of Higher Learning (IHL) and PlugFest Open for individuals from postgraduates to working professionals. The mentoring process for all participants will start from 15 February till 15 March 2013, during which teams will work closely with their mentors to improve their web apps. The top 20 percent of each category will be selected as finalists and asked to return on 3 April 2013 to present to a panel of judges which will include prominent members from the ICT industry, investment community (Angel Investors & Venture Capitalists) as well as educators.

Participants are also encouraged to join the various web app development workshops scheduled over the weekends from January 2013 to early February 2013. The workshop is free for all participants and will cover topics like available datasets from the Singapore Government’s data.gov.sg portal and selected mobile and cloud technologies such as Android, App Engine and Amazon Web Services.

Registration is open from now till 8 February 2013. So to all aspiring developers out there, this competition is not only a great learning opportunity but also a good testing bed for all the ideas that you’ve never had the time to validate.

 

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Japan’s Fuji TV Establishes $17 Million Startup Fund

Japan’s Nikkei ¹ reports today that national TV network Fuji TV has founded a venture capital fund called Fuji Startup Ventures, or FSV for short. The fund will be worth about 1.5 billion yen (approximately $17 million) to invest in startups developing apps and services that can be integrated with TV programs.

Fuji TV has many subsidiaries including radio stations, mail-order businesses, music companies, and book publishers. They aim to create business synergies between their existing subsidiaries and tech startups they will subsequently invest in.

As Japan’s younger generation drifts away from watching TV, private TV broadcasters are now forced to create a new revenue stream in addition to their primary business.

In 2012, we saw Fuji TV embark on some other digital endeavors, including opening new online channels on YouTube, and even cooperating with Rovio for an Angry Birds web game on the Fuji TV website.

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1. Unfortunately, paywalled.↩

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Nasik based MeraFoodChoice launches hybrid platform to order food for your train journey

Government of India has recently increased passenger  fare to offer better services and security, however availability of good quality vegetarian food in train is something, which still bother passengers. But now stop bothering about getting vegetarian foods while you are traveling on world’s largest rail network – Indian Railways as Nasik based MeraFoodchoice enables passengers to order local vegetarian food across 75 stations.

MeraFoodChoice (MFC) is an online food delivery platform, which bridges gap between the food providers located around various railway stations and passengers.  Currently, the startup offers options of choosing vegetarian meal across different restaurants spanning over 75 stations.

Users can search and order via MeraFoodChoice’s website or phone ( 8484848426 / 08484848426) either by using their Train number or PNR numbers. PNR number is necessary to confirm the validity of orders as MeraFoodChoice uses it to ascertain passenger’s coach, berth including expected arrival and departure time of train at given station.
The minimum order value MeraFoodChoice allows, is Rs.130 (though it varies from station to station). Presently the startup accounts 300 unique visitors on its website every day and serves 100 meal on an average per day without any spends on marketing. “More than 80% are repeat customers and I think we have a solid foundation with good strong restaurant relationships who work with us very closely using our proprietary software to track orders and trains”, said Piyush Suresh Kasliwal, founder and CEO, MeraFoodChoice.

The startup aims to serve 1000 meals per day in next 6 months. To ensure quality and hygiene, MeraFoodChoice  conducts lot of local surveys and has users generated rating/quality criteria for restaurants/vendors. The company ensures timely delivery at the opted station by passengers  and the background process lets the vendors know about the current status of the train and when to start cooking / packaging or delivery.

Launched in November 2012, MeraFoodChoice plans  to extend its platform to every town/city in India and begin home delivery and table booking with restaurants shortly. As of now, MeraFoodchoice is being bootstrapped by founder, however, it is in advance discussion with Venture capitals to raise funds.

MeraFoodChoice competes with recently launched Travelkhana, which connects train travellers with restaurants on the Indian Railways network and enables passengers to easily place orders (veg and non-veg meal) via website, phone, SMS, or mobile app. Importantly, at stations where the train stops for less than 5 minutes Travelkhana does not deliver orders.

Trying to solve a hard problem of last mile delivery, TravelKhana and MeraFoodChoice are startups to watch out for. With marketplace aggregator approach – will these players gain  immense traction sans getting into a head-on battle with Indian Railways network or IRCTC?

Next time if you are going for long journey with train, give these two startups spin and lets us know your feedback.

Related posts:

1. Traveling in a train? Order food using Travelkhana, a meal booking platform
2. A Look at 2 Startups Solving ‘Real India’ Problems : YoPharma, TravelKhana
3. Indian Railways Launches Real Time Train Tracking Service–Simran

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Fab Cafe in Tokyo Preps Sweet 3D Printing Workshop in Time for Valentine’s Day

We’ve had a few fun 3D printing stories over the past few weeks. You may recall this 3D printing photo studio from Xi’an, China which prints a miniature bust of the customer in just a few hours after the initial photo is snapped. But just across the water in Japan, the folks at Fab Cafe Tokyo are cooking up some 3D printing goodness that is just a little bit sweeter, and just in time for Valentine’s day.

In early February, Fab Cafe will hold a workshop for women where they can make 3D chocolates modeled from their own face using a 3D printer and scanner. The workshop will be held on consecutive Saturdays, February 2nd and 9th, and participants will be able to learn about 3D modeling. You’ll also have a chance to create a mould, from which you can later make your own chocolate replicas.

This particular event is targeting women, since the Valentine’s Day custom in Japan is for women to give chocolate to men. Fab Cafe notes that they are considering a similar event for men later, so there might be one leading up to ‘White Day,’ which is when men reciprocate by giving ladies something in return.

The workshop will cost 6000 yen (about $68), but for the information you’ll take away, not to mention the chocolate, it looks to be a pretty awesome deal. For our female readers in Japan, you can find out more details over on the Fab Cafe website.

(Via Chiho Komoriya on Japanese VW)

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Mojostreet targets global markets, launches “Ask a friend” feature

Hyderabad based Mojostreet, a social local search platform is launching to global markets. The company has also launched a revamped version of the app with new features – Ask A friend & Search filters. 

The latest version helps you look at the check-ins made by your friends on facebook too as part of your Friend Feeds on Mojostreet – i.e. a ‘graph search’ of sort,  that enables users to quickly ask a question about a specific place and get instant responses from friends who have visited that place before.

Mojostreet Ask Feature

“Search Filters” feature will help users find places of interest with minimal effort. The filters have been enabled across major categories including Food & Beverage, Shopping, Entertainment, Fitness/ Personal care and Travel.

For the international launch, the startup which raised $350K USD funding in 2011 is partnering with multiple companies across the globe for the location database.

Demoed at UnPluggd, Mojostreet’s Android app is currently a featured app in the Google Play store and the new revamped version provides users with social and in-depth search experience for finding the best local businesses in their city.

Do give the apps a spin and share your comments.  Are you still on Foursquare?

Recommended Read : 10+ Indian startups that went global

Related posts:

1. StartUp #6 – MojoStreet – Location Based Mobile Game With Real World Benefits
2. Mojostreet releases Android App – iPhone in the works as well
3. LBS Startup, Mojostreet Launches in Private Beta [Invites For Pluggd.in Readers]

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[Singapore] Office Hours Revealed With Jeffrey Paine

Office Hours Revealed With Jeffrey Paine

In this session, Jeffrey Paine will be sharing about his experiences as a VC, how he looks at companies to invest in and he will answer any questions and brainstorm solutions for problems you face!

This is a small event with limited tickets, so a small fee is required to prevent oversubscription. All fees will be donated to a social enterprise at The Hub. This is a not-for-profit event.

To register, please visit: https://secure.learnemy.com/groups/office-hours-revealed-jeffrey-paine/

About Jeffrey Paine
Jeffrey Paine is the founding partner of Golden Gate Ventures, an early stage technology incubator based in Singapore. Jeff started and manages the Founder Institute in Asia where he is currently overseeing its expansion in the Southeast Asian region. Since 2010 the Founder Institute in Singapore has graduated over 60 companies in Asia.

Jeff spent the first eight years of his career in early stage venture and private equity in the US, North and South Asia. He co-founded a China market entry advisory firm, which was then merged with a China mid-market private equity firm. He also cofounded Pyrks in early 2012 and currently sits on the board of TheMobileGamer, Acheev.it and AtticTV.

He is Singapore native and graduated with a Bachelors of Business Administration (Information Systems) from the University of Southern California.

Event details:

• Start: Tuesday, 5 February, 2013 07:00 p.m.
• End: Tuesday, 5 February, 2013 08:30 p.m.
• Venue : The Hub
• Register here
• Organizer : Learnemy

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