【Ex-Amazon and Real Estate Startup】Takahiro Morinaga - The Path to a New Startup: A Conversation with Global Talent
【Ex-Amazon and Real Estate Startup】Interview with Takahiro Morinaga, a Global Talent in action
This article will unraveled Takahiro Morinaga's dynamic career shift from Amazon to serial entrepreneurship, detailing his journey, challenges, and strategic pivots in pursuing global startup ventures, notably in real estate tech and cross-border markets.
Notable content:
Career Transition and Entrepreneurial Journey: Takahiro Morinaga's transition from a corporate career at Amazon to becoming a serial entrepreneur, including his motivations, challenges faced, and pivotal decisions in pursuing startups in both Japan and the United States.
Startup Experiences and Learnings: Insights into Morinaga's startup experiences, including the genesis of startup ideas, the process of founding companies (such as the real estate tech startup focusing on fractional ownership), and the iterative learning process involved in building and pivoting a business.
Global Perspective and Cross-Border Challenges: Discussion on the complexities of launching a business with a global perspective, navigating cross-border challenges, cultural differences, market dynamics in Japan and the U.S., and strategies for international expansion.
Personal Growth and Decision-Making: Exploration of Morinaga's personal growth as an entrepreneur, including his decision-making process in exiting previous ventures, reflections on failures and successes, and the role of mentorship and support networks in shaping his entrepreneurial journey.
—Welcome to the RiSiN Podcast. Thank you for appearing on the RiSiN Podcast today. Let me introduce this podcast again. RiSiN Podcast is a podcast that invites entrepreneurs, business people, investors, etc. who are active overseas and presents them in a conversation format with guests. The reason I started this podcast was I wanted to increase the number of startups and business people who are taking on challenges overseas. At the same time, I started for creating a useful media for people who want to try something overseas by focusing on and interviewing Japanese people who are active overseas. Mr. Morinaga, Nice to meet you.
Takahiro: “Nice to meet you too.”
— So firstly, I'd like you to introduce yourself briefly.
Takahiro: “Okay. Hi everyone again, my name is Takahiro Morinaga. Nice to meet you. I personally joined Amazon Japan as a new graduate after graduating from university and worked at Amazon for three or four years. I moved to San Francisco for the first time in May 2022, because I have wanted to take on challenges in America, especially starting my own startup since I was a student. I am currently running a startup based in the US while traveling back and forth between Japan and America.”
— Thank you. You moved to the U.S. after working at Amazon, right?
Takahiro: “Actually, I didn't move to America immediately.”
— I didn't know that.
Takahiro: “Yeah. I was actually in Osaka for about a year. I registered and operated a business at that time.”
— Really? I've never heard that.
Takahiro: “Yeah, I really didn't mention it.”
— What business were you doing at that time?
Takahiro: "My co-founder and I had the experience of studying abroad when we were students. We decided to work together on a project to solve the problem that international students are nervous, so we initially created an exchange app for expats and international students in Osaka.”
— That's too new to me. I did not know. okay. So, did you try that for a year and then quit?
Takahiro: “Actually, I didn't quit the business itself. We were wanting to do that business overseas as well. I had a desire to create a business, and product that would be used globally, so I started in Osaka with such a desire. But, for some reason, I had a chance to talk with people who are starting a business in San Francisco. I told him that I wanted to work globally someday, he said that I should come right away.”
— They taunted you at that time.
Takahiro: “Yeah, that's right. I also thought there was a way to do that, and I'd better go now because I want to do it globally someday. Within a month after talking with him, I had prepared my visa and prepared to travel to the U.S., and I went to America with co-founder.”
— By the way, what kind of work did you do at Amazon?
Takahiro: “I had changed departments once. The first time was with the Amazon Marketplace team, which is a competitor such as Rakuten, and I worked there to provide sales support to sellers, as well as EC consulting like how to increase sales on Amazon. In my second year, I transferred to Amazon's retail division. I was mainly in charge of the toy industry.”
— That's what you were doing at Amazon. I haven't heard much about your time at Amazon. What was the atmosphere like at a company like Amazon in Japan? Is there a culture where English is used fairly often?
Takahiro: “It varies depending on the department, but I used Japanese 80% of the time. I had some clients from Canada and America, so in some cases we communicated via email in English. Also there were things like business negotiations in English. In my case, I mostly used Japanese.”
— So, it's quite a domestic feeling. So, it really seems like some departments use English and others don't.
Takahiro: “Yes.”
— By the way, after studying and joining Amazon, when did you realize that you wanted to pursue your passion in work overseas?
Takahiro: “When I think of overseas, I've always admired America since I was a child.”
— Oh, really? okay. but why did you have aspiration for America?
Takahiro: “When I was little, around 5 years old, my parents took me to America for my first overseas trip. Ever since I was little, I have thought that I want to be able to speak English, that America is cool, and that America is the center of the world, including the economy. I grew up thinking that way, so I feel like I've always wanted to work around the world, or rather, in America.”
— Your experiences when you were little led you to become more aware of America and other countries.
Takahiro: “I was thinking that someday I would like to work in America.”
— That's how much of an impact you had. My image of a 5 or 6 year old is that there are many things not remembered. I thought that people would forget such memories in their childhood. But I guess it had quite an impact for you. Even at a young age
Takahiro: “Yeah... I think even when I was little, I thought that English was cool, that it was nice to go abroad, and that it was okay to go to places I didn't know.”
— I think you said that you are currently traveling back and forth between Japan and America and launching a startup. How many times has this been your startup?
Takahiro: “As I mentioned earlier, I started a company in Osaka after quitting Amazon once, closed it when I went to the U.S., moved to America in 2022, created a company in America as a American corporation in 2023, I also had to leave there now, I'm currently preparing, so I think this will be my third startup.”
— I see. I feel like you're really taking on a lot of challenges.
Takahiro: “Yes. I'm also surprised that I'm starting my third company.”
— By the way, how old are you currently Morinaga-san?
Takahiro: “I'm 29 years old now, the last year of my 20s.”
— Great taking on a challenge of 3 companies at the age of 29..
Takahiro: “Well, for me, I feel like I want to take on more challenges right now.”
— I think it's okay to take on challenges because you're still in 20s. You still have a lot of stamina, I think. mmm... let me see. The older you get, the more conservative you become. People in late 20s, or early 30s, are likely to take on the challenge. Of course, I personally believe that age has nothing to do with it. I believe that you can take on the challenge at any age. Well, what kind of startup was that second startup?
Takahiro: “In terms of category, the second company is I'm working on a startup in the real estate tech field, and to put it simply, my second company was creating a platform that allows overseas customers, primarily American customers, to jointly purchase villas in Japan.”
— I see. you mean... fractional ownership, right?
Takahiro: “Exactly!”
— Like ‘Not a Hotel’ in Japan is doing well. From my understanding, I feel like this is a scheme that is working well. However, I don't understand everything about Not a Hotel, but it incorporates elements of Web 3.0, and I don't know if it's a member of the NFT owner, a member, or what, I don't know, but if you have that. I feel like the concept was that you could stay at a hotel operated by Not a Hotel at a cheap price. Does that make sense?
Takahiro: “Yes. So things like fractional ownership are becoming very popular in America as well.”
— That's right.
Takahiro: “Even in Japan, there are companies like Not a Hotel. However, I had the impression that the idea of overseas people purchasing real estate in Japan on a fractional basis has not yet become commonplace.”
— I see. What led you to start it? I mean... the background... You had a co-founder, right?
Takahiro: “There was a co-founder.”
— So what is the background of the co-founder? Is it in the real estate field?
Takahiro: “In particular, neither of us were an expert in the real estate field.”
— That's interesting. What made you decide to take on that challenge?
Takahiro: “After moving to the United States, co-founder and I were thinking about how to run the business every day. Although we've come up with some ideas, we were talking about whether there were any speciality, like if we could utilize our Japanese heritage as a weapon, even though we are in America. When I think about this and look at the Americans around me, I find that there are a lot of people who like Japan, especially in California.”
— Yeah, they really love Japan.
Takahiro: “There are a lot of people who really love Japan, and they want to buy a vacation home or a house in Japan, but they can't get a loan, also they can't buy it all with cash on their own. I've heard that even if you buy it, you can only go to Japan for a limited time. I started working on an international exchange platform that I had originally set up in Osaka after I went to America, and I interviewed 100 international students and expats there. When I asked them what is hard about living in a foreign country, almost all people said it was housing problems. Of course, this applies to renting a house, and of course it also applies to purchasing a house, the way you rent and buy a house is different in each countries. Thanks to those interviews, we were able to utilize our own backgrounds, and we were able to settle on a business that allows us to sell Japanese real estate on a fractional basis.”
— It's true that for foreigners, renting and buying a house in Japan is quite difficult. if you can't speak Japanese, it will be difficult to process documents, and communication with agents will probably not be smooth. There are other troublesome things that come with renting a house, right? For example, it's difficult about a guarantor. Also in other countries, they don't have the idea about key money. They probably know about deposits, but the concept of key money in Japan is, I don't know... unique...?
Takahiro: “I probably haven't heard much either.”
— There aren't that many, right? I have also lived overseas for work and have rented properties in places like the Philippines and Malaysia, but this kind of idea of key money doesn't really exist outside of Japan, I guess... Don't you think they key money is like thanks to the landlord for lending you the house? For me, I feel like that. If they don't understand things like that, that makes them wonder why they have to pay, right? So, you were providing houses in the form of fractional ownership to Americans who love Japan in the United States. By the way, how did you find properties in Japan?
Takahiro: “At first, I found ski resorts in Japan are quite poplar with people from overseas for powder snow, so we talk with many real estate agents to let me list the properties. To let us approach people from overseas and attract customers. We talked with many agents.”
— I'm sorry for not being too knowledgeable, but is it possible that real estate agents immediately provide the properties they own as fractional ownership?
Takahiro: “As a real estate agent who helped sell overseas, we had a pretty good feeling about the impact we had on the market. There were many real estate agents that couldn't get around to the influx of customers, and I think customers were also quite positive about the value we were bringing.”
— I got it. Thank you. So, it's like you really came up with that concept and approach to attract customers to agents by utilizing their properties through your services as MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
Takahiro: “However, when it comes to selling fractional products, there are various laws and regulations which were hard to decide. For example, the rules for a house when customers buy together, whether if it's okay for foreigners to buy it, and if it's safe to use properties in this way. Before launching the MVP, we had a lawyer involved and thoroughly checked it.”
— Did you do anything like that before raising funds? Or did you raise funds first?
Takahiro: “We had fundings and investments at the idea stage.”
— That is really amazing.
Takahiro: “The idea has changed little by little since the time we raised funds. Even so, when we had the first startup, we raised funds at the idea phase.”
— What year did you raise funds?
Takahiro: “in 2023.”
— It probably wasn't good time for the market to raise funds.
Takahiro: “Funding was mainly from Japanese venture capital and angel investors. The market conditions in Japan were not as bad as in America, and with depreciation of yen, we were also receiving a lot of inquiries from overseas customers, so I think the timing was very good.”
— Come to think of it, I also met you at the time of raising funds.
Takahiro: “Yes... in San Francisco...”
— Thank you very much. I'm glad you made time for me. There are many stories that I didn't know about. I see.. so aren't there a lot of things that don't go well even at startups, such as the timing of testing the MVP? What kind of hard things did you experience at that time? If you had to pick three things, what would you say was difficult?
Takahiro: “First of all, it is far less likely that things will go exactly as planned.”
— That's true. Really.
Takahiro: “Things don't always go as planned. I felt that even after MVP was released. Second is... It was difficult to quickly decide what I should do next.”
— You mean PCDA, right?
Takahiro: “Yes. I wish I could find the way if plan A fails, what is plan B? and what is plan C? when plan B was no good. In our case, we deal with real estate, which is quite heavy, and it wasn't something that could be viewed online or only digitally, so it was difficult to make things faster because we targeted real estate. The last hard thing is... It may be strange to say when to withdraw. It was very difficult to draw the line on what to pivot this business. I might be able to do it if I try a little harder, or not, so it was hard to make that decision.”
— By the way, how many people were on the team at that time?
Takahiro: “I was mainly working with my co-founder, as the two of us.”
— It might be difficult to talk a sort of things. Swiftness and speed is especially important when you start running, but there are many things you can't control yourselves properly if it's just the two of you. While doing various things, I believe you did many testing of various hypotheses. Did you decide to quit during the MVP phase?
Takahiro: “Well, something inside me... I was investigating various things in the field of Cross-Border and real estate for about a year and a half. During that time, we were unable to achieve anything. Also I had doubts about whether I should continue with the business, and as I said at the beginning, I wanted to do more startups in America and overseas, so I moved to America. However, the startup I worked on before was like half of me is in Japan and the other half is in America... I thought that I can't go out of Japan... like I was in limbo... Also, when I compared it to my lifestyle as an entrepreneur, I wanted to do more in America, and I wanted to challenge and compete in the American market so that's the decision I've made at this time.”
— But I'm surprised you made such a decision. If I were in that position, I would not have the confidence to make the decision to exit properly. Don't you have that particular feeling? You started it with your co-founder, raised funds, and did a lot of things for the time being. I don't have any children, but isn't it like having children? It takes a lot of determination and courage to let go of that. You did very well. There may have been all kinds of complicated feelings, but how does the decision-making process... How did you decide to leave? It probably wasn't easy.
Takahiro: “Honestly, I was really struggling. I felt sorry for the people who believed in me, and invested. On the other hand, it was also a good opportunity for me to reflect on what I wanted to do in my one lifetime. However, the people who supported me the most were all the entrepreneurs in San Francisco, my seniors. As I consulted with my seniors about the current situation, they gave me a lot of advices, and they told me that they'd like to work with me in America again.”
— That’s wonderful.
Takahiro: “Thinking back now, I think was able to make the decision with the support of other seniors working in America.”
— Thank you. You have really good experience. At such a young age... Well... I guess that experience helped you grow as a person in many ways. Even just listening to the story. I'm sure you have a lot of ideas and things you're about to launch, but if you were to start over, how do you think you'd start?
Takahiro: “Actually, last time, after I decided to leave the company, I wrote down all 50 things that I thought had gone wrong at my previous startup. I also wrote down 50 things that I would like to do next time, making a total of 100 things. To give an example, which market do I want to work in? Of course, there are also Japan and America. For me, I'd like to run a business which can challenge in America. That is one condition that I cannot compromise on right now.”
— The market is important, thank you very much. We are going to finish the first half and take a little break. In the next time, the topic is global, and I'd like to ask you a variety of questions, so I would like to conclude the first half with this. Mr. Morinaga, thank you for talking with us. I'm really looking forward to see you in the next half.
Takahiro: “Thank you very much.”