In this episode we are joined by Fuminori Gunji. Gunji was a founding team member of Softbank Robotics from 2013 to 2016, leading Softbank's domestic B2B businesses and overseas expansion efforts. In 2017, Fuminori Gunji headed business development for MakeLeaps. By the end of 2018, Gunji had successfully closed MakeLeaps’ M&A deal with Ricoh and went on to lead MakeLeaps in 2019 as COO until resigning in 2021. Fuminori is an adviser at Blue Circle and a mentor for 500 Startups, a global VC firm.
In this episode we do something different. Rather than having an English and a Japanese episode we are promoting a new model and mixing it all up in the one episode. The first half is in English and we dive in Gunji-san's journey of being raised in German, Japanese and English and how he leveraged his unique background to ever be creating new opportunities and value for his customers and then we switch to Japanese and talk about everything from reverse culture shock to the challenges surrounding the Japanese model of 'copy paste' when it comes to global expansion and about the mindset shift that happens when you think of every single person around you as a customer.
I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. I'd invite you to go ahead and share this episode with anyone in your network who might benefit from it.
Key conversations
🇬🇧 04:35 | Gunji-san's Journey
🇬🇧 16:00 | Lessons applicable from big corporations that served Gunji-san well in his startups
🇯🇵 35:55 | Reverse culture shock
🇯🇵 46:40 | Reflections on Japanese management practice
To learn more about Gunji-san, connect with him here:
LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/fuminori-gunji-38a22589/
Blue Circle | https://www.bluecircle.co.jp/
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