Kinneko Works
Cross-border Business Development
Japan · Taiwan · Southeast Asia
What We Do
Strategy
Define the right market, direction, and approach.
Explore
Discover needs, markets, technologies, and people.
Develop
Build businesses, partnerships, and pathways to market.
Where We Work
Japan · Taiwan · Singapore · Malaysia · Philippines · Thailand · and beyond
How We Work
Understand
What is really happening?
Identify
What really needs to be solved?
Design
What should we do?
Develop
Make it happen.
Continuously revisit and refine as we learn.
Services
Market Entry
Enter and develop new markets.
New Business Development
Create and develop new businesses.
Selected Experience
Market Entry
Japan Market Entry
Challenge
The pitch focused on presenting a broad range of technologies rather than making a compelling case for investment and collaboration.
Contribution
Redesigned the information and pitch to establish the company’s technological superiority, world-changing impact, and credibility, driving investment and collaboration decisions. Delivered the pitch and drove discussions with Japanese investors and corporations, bridging language, business, and cultural differences.
Outcome
Positive feedback led to discussions about expanding support for the Japan market entry.
Cross-border Business Bridging
Challenge
Creating business opportunities required more than language support. It required understanding the startups’ technologies, their underlying value and applications, while uncovering the real needs behind what potential customers initially expressed.
Contribution
Engaged with companies visiting an international trade show in Taiwan, identified their underlying needs, connected those needs with what the startups could enable, and translated technical, business, and cultural contexts to move conversations toward business opportunities.
Outcome
Created concrete business opportunities for 4 startups, leading to in-depth discussions on potential collaboration across Taiwan, Japan, and Singapore.
New Business Development
Business Model Development
Challenge
An existing wastewater-to-energy concept was built around selling the supplier’s own equipment rather than customer value.
Contribution
Redesigned the solution from the customer’s perspective, optimizing technology and cost while shifting from equipment sales to a recurring service model.
Outcome
Proposed the business plan to prospective customers in Thailand, gathered operational insights from their factories, and further refined the model.
New Business Launch
Challenge
Transform an R&D concept for organic hydroponics into a commercially viable business.
Contribution
Led the business from market validation and business planning through the design, procurement, and launch of a pilot facility, working across internal teams and external partners.
Outcome
Established and operated the pilot facility, validated customer needs and commercial feasibility, and supported the decision on whether to proceed with commercialization.
New Business Mentoring
Challenge
Help newly hired employees turn early-stage ideas into viable new business plans while developing their own ability to think and decide.
Contribution
Mentored teams through dialogue and questioning, supporting their thinking and encouraging them to pursue ideas they found genuinely interesting, while providing practical guidance on customers, markets, business models, and research methods.
Outcome
Supported approximately 20–30 teams over 2 years in developing new business plans and making their own informed decisions.
About
Kinneko Works
Kinneko Works is a business development company that creates and develops new business opportunities across markets and borders.
We explore needs, technologies, people, and markets, discover new possibilities, and develop them into businesses and partnerships.
Find something interesting. Make it even more interesting.
Founded 2026
Headquarters Ginza, Tokyo, Japan
Corporate Number 6010003050366
Founder Nobuaki Sato
Nobuaki Sato
Business Cat-alyst | Founder
Nobuaki Sato is a business development professional with over 18 years of experience in new business development, cross-border business, and technology commercialization.
His professional experience spans 11 countries across Asia, Europe, and the United States. He identifies new possibilities across people, technologies, companies, and markets, and develops them into business opportunities.
His approach is simple: find something interesting and make it even more interesting.