SPEAKER_00: Let me drink a hot cup of tea. Sho, that didn't get picked up on the mic, did it? SPEAKER_02: How's it going, Sho? You okay? SPEAKER_03: Okay, everybody, welcome back to This Week in Startups in Japan. Chamath Palihapitiya: It's great, great to be back in my favorite city in all the world after my hometown of New York, my new hometown of Austin. That's Tokyo. Man, I love coming here. It's always so inspiring. If you're a founder, if you're an investor, and you haven't come to Japan, SPEAKER_06: I highly recommend coming because you get to see people building and working with extreme pride and trying to get better at building their product or service every day of their life. SPEAKER_07: It's called Kaizen, is the Art of Constant Improvement. The founders here in our second cohort of Founder University have been incredible. SPEAKER_06: I was telling my team, the first cohort, we had so many great companies, but very raw. We were just getting started. And the second cohort, we saw a lot more companies that were ready to go global and that had their company formation in the United States. So I think we're actually going to find some really great investments or candidates to come to our accelerator. If you want to find out about this Founder University program, we run it twice a year in Tokyo, twice a year in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and then twice a year in the United States. Founder.university is the webpage where you can see all three programs. The sun never sets on Founder University, and you don't even need to be incorporated. It could be you and two of your friends. Chamath Palihapitiya: You've built a project. You've got a prototype. You've vibe-coded something in lovable or Claude Code or Grok or perplexity computer. We want to see it all. We love to work with founders in year zero. And I'm super excited today because we have Dr. Yuki Hanyu, SPEAKER_06: and he is making cultivated meat. And you're doing this in a different way than some of the cultured meats that we got to experience in America. SPEAKER_08: I think Impossible Meat was one? That is actually plant-based meat. That's plant-based meat. Yeah. And then what was the next one that did chicken in America? SPEAKER_09: Upside Foods. Ah, yes. Yeah, so there are major companies in this field. It's like Upside Foods. Believer Meat is now defunct, but there's like Wild Tite with that so-called salmon. Ah, yes. What was the salmon one called? SPEAKER_08: Wild Tite. Well, yeah. SPEAKER_06: So this has been around for a couple of years, and between the veggie, the fake chicken, fake fish, or mock, I think is the term, it's gotten some fans in America, but it hasn't broken out yet. SPEAKER_10: Why? Why hasn't it become very mainstream, or has it? SPEAKER_09: I would say it's just the technology just not being there, because the issue has always been the scaling and unit price. SPEAKER_16: Got it. And also on the other side, that will be the unit economics that's not quite working yet. SPEAKER_06: Got it. So consumers have shown they want it, correct? SPEAKER_09: That's another, because unless you have sufficient quantity, you can't even test for real to the consumers. SPEAKER_20: And until then, it will be all fantasy, to be honest. SPEAKER_07: There hasn't been enough scale for a large amount of customers to try it, so it's hard to understand demand. But I know from my friend group in San Francisco… You can always ask. Yes. SPEAKER_25: What consumers say and what they actually buy are always very different, as you know. SPEAKER_26: As Steve Jobs taught us, right? If he asked people what they wanted in an iPhone, SPEAKER_06: it would not be beautiful, elegant. And I guess when it comes to food, if you were to ask a chef, SPEAKER_30: if the chef were to ask you what you wanted, you would not be as delicious as omokase. SPEAKER_32: Yeah, correct? SPEAKER_33: Yeah. I go for like half price. Yes. 30% off. Yeah. Things like that. SPEAKER_06: Yeah. You want to really have… So your company, Integrie Culture, is working on a new way to create this food, yes? SPEAKER_37: Yes. I would say protein. SPEAKER_39: Protein specifically. Without the call, our product has meat. That's a different story. SPEAKER_06: Got it. So for protein, and it's going to get a little graphic, so people be prepared if you… You know, we're talking about meat. But the ingredients and the process SPEAKER_03: for creating mock meat previously, this was using FBS in some cases. SPEAKER_09: Not really, because I would say FBS has been only for like a laboratory scale tests for like a regenerative medicine, cell culture, like those things. Yes. SPEAKER_16: And no one has actually made any commercial product with FBS. It's too expensive anyway. SPEAKER_30: Too expensive. And this is, of course, fetal bovine serum. That's the blood of unborn calves. SPEAKER_49: And that's going to be used for organs in our body. SPEAKER_16: Maybe? Maybe. But even within that field, SPEAKER_09: because such a quality control of FBS is really difficult. Yes. As you can imagine, how would you control the exact chemical composition SPEAKER_16: if it's made that kind of way? Yes. So, the industry is going to… I mean, medicine, pharma, bio-pharma. Yes. They're going to chemically defined ones, SPEAKER_47: but very expensive. But it's medicine anyway. SPEAKER_06: How were some of the other companies built the mock fish? I'm going to say mock fish and mock chicken. Yeah. How did they make it taste? For me, I tasted the chicken, and when they put it in sauce, I didn't taste very different. It tasted a little different, but I would say maybe it was 70% as good as real chicken to me. SPEAKER_07: So, what was the strategy they used for those specific verticals? SPEAKER_09: So, obviously, there's different levels of, I would say, imitation level completeness for cell-cultured meat. Cell-cultured meat, yes. Yeah. So, if you're talking about… 100% cell-cultured is a little bit hypothetical, but if there is one, that's kind of like synthetic diamond versus natural diamond. So, it's basically talking about chemically the same thing. So, no wonder it tastes just like chicken. Yes. But as of now, because of the state of technology, it's not 100% imitation. Somewhere like, say, 70%, let's say. What do you think it's at now? SPEAKER_67: If you were to pick. SPEAKER_68: I would say, I think, as of now, the 70% is like the maximum, SPEAKER_09: and the reason is, like, right now, the cell-cultured meat, what they say, is made in like large stirred-tank bioreactors, and it is not making steak. It's making like slurry of cells. Yes. So, you have to modify the slurry of cells to taste and look and taste like meat, but it's not quite the actual muscle tissue. SPEAKER_06: Got it. So, right now, anybody who is a vegetarian has turned off the podcast. That's okay. But for us who do like meat, it makes a slurry, which has the chemical composition, but now it doesn't have texture. So, it doesn't have the fabric of meat that we like in a different cut of steak, different cut of chicken. You might like the chicken breast. I might like the chicken wing. The fibers and the structure is another piece of this. Some people were making a 3D printed one or other techniques, but essentially, current state of the art is making this in a big giant vat with chemicals SPEAKER_07: in order to get activated, and then you make the slurry, and then you put it into chunks, I guess, SPEAKER_09: or different formats. Or chemicals, but exactly speaking, things like glucose, amino acids, which is like something we eat every day anyway. SPEAKER_81: Yes. SPEAKER_06: Okay. So, you have a different technique for this that you're pursuing. Tell us about it. SPEAKER_16: Yeah. So, first of all, we are not aiming for meat. So, we're making something as trademarked as Kraft Essen. SPEAKER_09: It sounds a little bit German, but it's just, well, SPEAKER_25: Japanese people sometimes do that kind of thing. Just take any long words without even knowing the origin of the word. Yes. But anyway. SPEAKER_03: Yeah. I have seen this. Chamath Palihapitiya: Sometimes you'll go to a cafe and it has a name that doesn't, for the American mind, SPEAKER_89: make a lot of sense. So, tell us the German word you're using. Yeah. Kraft Essen. So, basically, SPEAKER_09: Kraft food. Kraft food. Yeah. So, basically, yeah. So, that is basically cell-cultured duck liver cells on cellular scaffolds that actually looks like this. SPEAKER_93: Got it. Yeah. So, you're going to make duck liver like pate? SPEAKER_09: Yeah. So, it's actually the same cells as foie gras. SPEAKER_95: I love foie gras, SPEAKER_96: but I feel guilty eating it. SPEAKER_81: Well, if you don't need to, if it's cell-cultured. Yes. SPEAKER_80: Then I can eat foie gras every day. SPEAKER_81: Make sure you get enough vegetables as well. SPEAKER_80: Okay. Yes. SPEAKER_97: So, the first product you're making is going to be foie gras-ish. SPEAKER_70: Foie gras, well, if we decide to go with that marketing strategy, but probably not. SPEAKER_07: Yeah. This is a very niche market. What is the technique you're using and what's unique about your technique? SPEAKER_20: Yeah. So, we have a number of ways, SPEAKER_09: but it traces back to our origin as a company. So, originally, we were not even a company or even a for-profit entity. We were more like an open-source cultured meat project. I do that DIY cell-cultured meat, making cell-cultured meat at home. SPEAKER_25: Wow. The manual is here, by the way. Oh, wow. SPEAKER_102: So, there are nerds, SPEAKER_06: that's a technical word in America, there are nerds who want to do this at home as a hobby. Yeah. You're one of them. SPEAKER_08: Yeah. You're the leader of the nerds? SPEAKER_81: Yeah, because I thought it was funny. SPEAKER_25: You thought it was funny SPEAKER_13: to make meat at home. SPEAKER_25: Yeah, and I was basically distributing this manual in comic market. SPEAKER_06: So, I would go to a comic store and you have the manual here, I'm holding it up, that has all the different tools you need to make your own meat at home. SPEAKER_70: Yes, I think some of the copies are still in comic book in Akihabara, still. SPEAKER_20: In Akihabara. But also in London Science Museum. SPEAKER_110: In the London Science Museum. Hilarious. How many years ago did you start this hobby? One of the most important things you can do as a busy founder is stay focused. You need to prioritize the decisions and workflows that are going to move your company forward, not get lost in extraneous details and minutia. That's why the best decision you can make for your business is signing up with Every. Every is the all-in-one platform for incorporation, banking, payroll, benefits, taxes, basically your entire back office. They're going to keep up with all the bookkeeping and paperwork so you can stay laser-focused on your next big product or hiring, features, customers, all that important stuff. If you're just getting started, they're going to handle your Delaware C-Corp and getting yourself a registered agent all with no legal fees and no delays. And Every has worked with over 1,000 startups already. That's the kind of know-how and experience you can rely on. So head over to Every.io and stop wasting time on stuff that isn't growing your company. That's E-V-E-R-Y.io. SPEAKER_25: So yeah, we started back in 2014. It's called Shojin Meat Project. It's still ongoing. SPEAKER_06: Okay, so 10 years ago, over 10 years ago, you start this open-source project. Yeah. And how did that grow and who joined it? SPEAKER_25: Yeah, all sorts of random people. Very random. Some of them, like high school students. It was actually SPEAKER_09: one of the high school students who did the DIY cell culture at home and NHK came to film her growing cells in her room and that SPEAKER_16: got televised nationwide and that sort of funded led to the seed funding of Integrry Culture which is the direct spin-off from this Shojin Meat Project, this DIY movement. Got it. Yeah. SPEAKER_06: So there's the DIY open-source movement created your company and how many people participated and actually made lab-grown meat at home over the last 10 years? SPEAKER_09: We haven't been even counting actually because at least we have... Hundreds, thousands? I would say including those who did cell culture in schools after following the teacher's instructions and the teacher being trained by the Shojin Meat Project workshop. SPEAKER_122: Yeah. SPEAKER_09: I just don't know SPEAKER_122: the number. SPEAKER_49: But maybe thousands even... Potentially, I don't know. Potentially, yeah. SPEAKER_06: And so this technique maybe you can show us some of the items you have here Chamath Palihapitiya: but you've got a technique for doing this that's open-source and then you're going to go to market with it and you've raised a seed round, yeah? SPEAKER_126: Yeah, so in the early phase SPEAKER_09: our worry was that so the cell culture could change the world but it could also easily get into the GMO situation like being politicized basically if we just let capitalism take this things go bad so we need a cleverer way SPEAKER_16: so what we came up was to build an ecosystem so Shojin Meat Project is open-source they do the more visionary stuff like in this latest zine and then there's SPEAKER_09: Cell Agricultural Institute of Commerce non-profit they speak with the government regulators and maybe like established industry association then there's Integricultural Company that builds the physical infrastructure SPEAKER_16: and anyone who want to develop cell culture meat could use Integricultural Company's capabilities these materials SPEAKER_09: equipment and in the future production capability got it SPEAKER_06: so you're starting with the products you need to do it at home or business if you wanted to start a startup and then eventually they'll be able SPEAKER_117: to come and you might have a factory to do this on behalf of some other entrepreneurs SPEAKER_126: yeah if things SPEAKER_16: go well what we are going to get is there's some hobbies developing if it's good and they want he or she want to expand they could come to Integricultural Companies to expand so that way how to make is open source how to scale SPEAKER_09: on the business got it SPEAKER_134: it's almost I think they call it contract manufacturing in the United States so you come up with your formula and then somebody else packages it Chamath Palihapitiya: for you and then there's distributors after that SPEAKER_06: you mentioned two different meats together this is I think something people don't understand we're comparing it to things that we've put in our mouth before and flavors Chamath Palihapitiya: that we understand so I understand tuna chotoro o toro SPEAKER_140: had all these great flavors seared toro Chamath Palihapitiya: then I also understand wagyu Miyazaki beef 585 New York strip SPEAKER_06: Australian beef different profiles but somebody could take these two concepts and build a flavor profile that somehow incorporates toro yuzu flavor and SPEAKER_142: maybe SPEAKER_06: steak SPEAKER_142: yeah SPEAKER_37: yeah SPEAKER_16: so if it's still cultured you can't design that like meat or better say SPEAKER_13: fruit in any way you want so has anybody done anything interesting that you've tasted valve foods it's an Australian company they did like quail meat quail yeah SPEAKER_09: quail yes this little SPEAKER_15: little birds yeah which SPEAKER_25: has never been on the supermarket in a packaged quail SPEAKER_16: here's the quail meat yes by setting the initial products of quail meat they cannot SPEAKER_09: benchmark against any existing category so they can't put whatever price they want and also it shows the possibility of this technology right so they have been some stunts SPEAKER_25: like mammoth meat but a bit more more on the realistic side when they actually distribute stuff they went with quail SPEAKER_89: well and it's somewhat controversial and so SPEAKER_06: I'll be delicate but in certain cultures the idea of killing a cow you know in some countries is considered a sin and just terrible other cultures you know in Alaska seal meat dolphin meat whale meat is part of the culture history and then in other cultures it's looked at as a very big controversy between the West and in fact Japan and in Nordic countries we don't we consider oh my god how could you kill a whale or how could you kill a dolphin it's very strange first time I one of the first times I came to Japan I went to the Tsukiji fish market before it was popular SPEAKER_162: and I SPEAKER_06: saw this beautiful meat in bricks SPEAKER_162: and I SPEAKER_06: said oh it must be this beautiful tuna and then I got closer and closer and it was whale beautiful cuts of whale and I was like whoa I've never seen that before so sometimes things that maybe are either extinct or maybe controversial you can't sell whale meat in America so not allowed contraband just like in some countries now in some places foie gras is considered too cruel to create and they don't let people do it SPEAKER_32: that people were just not able to access let's say SPEAKER_166: yeah so those things are on the possibility as a niche market so the SPEAKER_16: market has developed it starts with some stunt products then niche products then something a bit more mainstream before going to the actual mainstream SPEAKER_81: so the industry has to take each SPEAKER_22: steps to reach the mainstream SPEAKER_06: what stage are we in now are we in the stunt phase SPEAKER_22: got it SPEAKER_06: so are you able to buy many of SPEAKER_03: these stunt meats in supermarkets now SPEAKER_126: well right now in Japan because the food regulation is not ready yet so it's not there SPEAKER_20: in Singapore some yes with Val Foods and Parima which is a French company that makes self-cultured foie gras they've got the clearance but I don't think they have put it on the market SPEAKER_09: yet oh you haven't SPEAKER_169: tried it yet or have you SPEAKER_09: tried Val Foods quail meat yes how was it well I enjoyed it although because it's a stunt meat would I eat it every day or SPEAKER_16: regularly probably not but because it's expensive partially SPEAKER_30: what is it per pound versus real quail yeah SPEAKER_33: I don't know the price of a real quail but anyway so that's the whole point but anyway it's much SPEAKER_30: it's multiple times the cost of poultry SPEAKER_20: or chicken and partially because it was in a fancy restaurant SPEAKER_03: yeah SPEAKER_20: so it was a good experience yes SPEAKER_06: it's also interesting maybe you wouldn't normally use Chamath Palihapitiya: a larger quantity or a different format for example to use 5A5 incredible Kobe beef or Wagyu Miyazaki beef in a hot dog or for like a bacon or some common meat or you know to make you know hash brown or like a corned beef hash you would never use it it's too high quality you'd be offensive to use it so you could have maybe more accessibility you could have a hot dog that's a Wagyu hot dog this might be the best idea ever maybe I should contract manufacture this yeah SPEAKER_16: but actually when it comes to those stunt products it doesn't have to be like it doesn't have to be just food that you're selling it could be part of a bigger experience like so for example have you heard of a video game called Cyberpunk 2077 yeah of course yeah so basically if there's a if there's some sort of special event of Cyberpunk 2077 and part of the event is the cell-cultured meat SPEAKER_09: so basically you're selling not just the cell-cultured stuff itself but it's the you're selling the whole experience got it so that's the sort of the approach we have to take for this like stunt market SPEAKER_06: when will the regulatory framework SPEAKER_178: make it possible to put these in more supermarkets and more restaurants SPEAKER_22: yeah so well you mean in Japan right yeah so that depends on what SPEAKER_16: consumer affairs agencies say that they at least did the hearing session to consumer groups already okay and so the industry those industry association people says well end of this summer or maybe beginning of autumn so it's like very close I would I hope yeah Chamath Palihapitiya: in America and maybe you know about this more than I do there were some places Florida or Texas that wanted to ban SPEAKER_30: these things yes yeah I don't know those haven't passed or those are controversial I think SPEAKER_185: yeah because it has become a part of the culture war in the US yeah SPEAKER_186: the founders I'm talking to are shipping code faster than ever thanks to AI but one big important question remains if every feature you write and ship has to slow down for an overwhelmed database what's the point but fear not the solution is MongoDB instead of wrestling with rigid schemas and painfully reworking antiquated data structures and formats MongoDB's native data model perfectly mirrors the language LLMs are already speaking MongoDB gives you the flexibility to ship at the speed of AI the ACID compliance guarantees you actually get to sleep at night while it scales to handle massive fortune 500 workloads and the best part is developers swear by it literally I can't use the actual words they said in this ad so let's just call it a really great database SPEAKER_110: start building at MongoDB.com slash AI Chamath Palihapitiya: because it seems woke to have mock meat as opposed to it might taste better or it might be more interesting or it might be more luxury product it could be framed as those but people are trying to protect the cattle industry maybe SPEAKER_104: well to be honest I talked about the scale earlier and the SPEAKER_16: scale is so tiny that is I think it's 0.001% or even less compared to the existing meat industry so it's not even a dent to the industry but it's just SPEAKER_194: too woke SPEAKER_06: how many cycles do we need to do sprints to get Chamath Palihapitiya: it to be the same price as the equivalent product today do you think SPEAKER_185: so sprints Chamath Palihapitiya: or years you know how many you know revisions do you still need you know do you have to do maybe 10 revisions 5 revisions every 6 months and you know 2 or 3 years from now it'll be same price for a steak or chicken breast yeah SPEAKER_185: so actually what could SPEAKER_20: happen is that because the existing meat price is also the moving target because of all the climate change and geopolitical this and that well let's assume SPEAKER_04: meat prices continue to go up maybe 5% a year so it's going to double every 10 years I think is what it's done previously yeah SPEAKER_09: so to meat categories like eel foie gras I think price is close and when it comes to like regular beef if you're SPEAKER_16: talking about wagyu beef things like that it also depends on texture but I would say like 10 years or so but it also depends on the branding actually yeah because it's actually paying for the brand rather than the meat itself when SPEAKER_10: they make chicken breast they make chicken nuggets that's SPEAKER_16: the hardest one so it could why is it the hardest one because it's cheap so you have to make it cheap you have to you probably have to go with a large scale factory or something yeah which even if the technology is ready you know how many years it takes to build a nuclear power station yeah so we'll be talking about that kind of things like a decade yeah SPEAKER_210: or two maybe SPEAKER_16: and we don't have the technology yet SPEAKER_06: so when do you as a startup you've raised a seat around how do you stay in business long enough to you know Chamath Palihapitiya: get there because obviously you're enabling other people so you're selling the tools yeah and the system SPEAKER_213: so SPEAKER_09: by making ourselves a cell agriculture company rather than cell cultured food or cell cultured SPEAKER_16: meat company SPEAKER_214: got it yeah SPEAKER_16: so there's this kind of like nested like fields of ideas cell cultured meat is a future form of SPEAKER_09: cell cultured cell cultured cell cultured food and outside the cell cultured food we have cell cultured cosmetic cell cultured leather maybe like SPEAKER_16: well this is plastic but anyway yeah and even outside that we have regenerative medicine and other like biopharma stuff so SPEAKER_09: we are cell agriculture company rather than cell cultured food or even cell cultured meat got it SPEAKER_217: and leather could be really interesting yeah SPEAKER_09: yeah and beauty cell cultured cosmetics yeah that's one one of the ways of like keeping us alive SPEAKER_117: tell me about the cosmetics is it a better product a cheaper product are you making things that can't be made SPEAKER_06: or today and you're gonna have breakthrough products SPEAKER_20: yeah so it also resonates with what we discussed a little bit earlier about this previously impossible sort of food SPEAKER_09: so when it comes to cell culture we can make some of SPEAKER_16: yeah one of the most common beauty ingredients like placenta in Japan and East Asia but that's that alone like safety is one ethical side is another but if it's cell culture it basically solves all these problems and another is that like SPEAKER_09: becoming more important but supply chain stability SPEAKER_39: is another it is in competition to so-called stem cell serum a lot imported from Korea SPEAKER_97: got it so this is something for your face or something or this ingredient would go into another product SPEAKER_09: or to our client's your client's product yeah and that one's more supply chain stable because we don't we don't need to SPEAKER_16: import from Korea got it and the existing stem cell serum is human cells but that one's like vaccine grade eggs SPEAKER_81: yes and also it's actually a little bit cheaper yeah SPEAKER_226: so better SPEAKER_97: supply chain more ethical SPEAKER_226: less controversy SPEAKER_13: safer safer so many things to navigate yeah just with this particular brand alone right and we could develop all sorts SPEAKER_16: of other products using different cells SPEAKER_230: you can make something better SPEAKER_30: yeah ah fascinating SPEAKER_16: yeah SPEAKER_30: and so how much money have you raised so far who's the investors is it venture capital yet or just crazy seed SPEAKER_127: investors crazy angel investors yeah SPEAKER_234: so so far SPEAKER_16: our fund rates so far have been something like somewhere between 15 to 20 million USD which is far less smaller compared to our like industry peers in the US or like in Europe SPEAKER_237: yeah but it's still big amount of money for Japan yeah and you have SPEAKER_06: how many years to figure all this out two years to make it work ah SPEAKER_09: well initially we like we have been doing cosmetics from day one oh SPEAKER_239: so you have revenue now SPEAKER_09: oh yeah oh amazing yeah so that's actually one of the reasons why a lot of our better better funded peers are collapsing while SPEAKER_39: like we're totally healthy we actually turned profitable last year oh SPEAKER_06: congratulations it's fantastic because you picked a good beachhead market you have a good first market Chamath Palihapitiya: ideal customer yeah yeah and then you wait for the other things to show up and also the contract manufacturing and building the tools SPEAKER_13: a little bit in the future but yes we already provide SPEAKER_81: the tools but yes yeah Chamath Palihapitiya: and that business could be big too yeah SPEAKER_13: yeah Chamath Palihapitiya: excellent so this is an important lesson for a lot of founders we talked earlier like sometimes you have a big vision we have one founder here who wants to put robots for elder care you know and the robots aren't going to be ready for one or he thinks one year I think two maybe realities three what can you do SPEAKER_217: before the future is ready right before the technology is ready you have to find really good ideas SPEAKER_248: then there's a trick SPEAKER_09: because I would better say a trap but because a lot of venture capitalists when they invest they basically tell you to focus on something which goes against that sort of strategy right Chamath Palihapitiya: only focus on one thing as opposed to have a series of what I call waypoints a series of islands you can stop at before you get to the new world yeah SPEAKER_20: yeah so like in early days like they say 2020 SPEAKER_16: or something like there has been like even from within the company to focus on meat rather than doing cosmetics SPEAKER_230: so you had to as the founder get everybody around the right idea that could generate revenue today SPEAKER_16: because there will be this hype cycle stuff there will be hype crash so we need to be ready by then got it Chamath Palihapitiya: and is this your first company your first startup what have you learned and then we'll open up to questions if you have questions you can line up at the microphone what have you learned what mistakes have you made that you've corrected in terms of company building raising capital you know and getting product market fit yeah or mistakes that mistakes yeah SPEAKER_186: painful our show is filled with helpful and practical advice for founders but there's another reason to become a regular twist listener amazing deals on essential products to help you run your company more effectively so I'm super excited to announce our new deal with agree.com the all-in-one contract to cash flow workflow go right now to agree.com sign up and tell them you're a JCal listener and they'll give you 50% off for life agree is the number one fastest way to go from contract to cash that means gathering e-signatures invoicing billing payments and revenue recovery no more jumping between four or five different platforms just to write out a contract get it signed then set up billing and start sending out invoices 99.64% of all invoices on the entire platform are paid within just 10 days so if you want to stop chasing invoices go right now to agree.com and if you tell them Jason sent you you're gonna SPEAKER_263: get 50% off for life SPEAKER_09: team building really matters that's one and team building starts from day zero of like SPEAKER_16: okay let's do something within yourself decide to do something which could be a startup could be a non-profit or whatever but doing it alone so called solo planner possible but eventually you need to find someone else to work with yes SPEAKER_230: and you have to get it right if you get it wrong you have to correct SPEAKER_69: very quickly quick iterations is everything SPEAKER_16: quick iterations yeah but even with quick iteration I would say something like SPEAKER_09: some I would say the polaris star or whatever like the general SPEAKER_25: direction SPEAKER_09: yes SPEAKER_25: of I think that's something you call a vision yeah yeah for us it was easy because I could do it like I also do like computer graphics SPEAKER_09: so I basically showed all these images that I made for fun and that's where we're going to and right SPEAKER_276: like Elon says we're going to Mars but before SPEAKER_06: Mars we have to get a rocket and put some stuff in space and then we can have Starlink to help solve a problem with the rockets that generates David Friedberg: revenue SPEAKER_16: by drawing this kind of things it actually gives you an idea of okay that's all future what component technologies do we actually need so SPEAKER_07: working backwards from science fiction in a crazy SPEAKER_25: vision yeah because the reason why I started working on self-culture media is because of science fiction anime manga and video games oh really SPEAKER_30: because you SPEAKER_13: got it SPEAKER_118: utopian future yeah like dolaemon SPEAKER_282: yeah very nice okay so some questions so tell me about how you get to product market fit while we wait for the questions SPEAKER_09: yeah to be honest when it comes to food it's not in product market fit yet because we cannot even put product on the market yet so that's work in progress but when it comes to cosmetics then like SPEAKER_16: it's lots of like asking conversations trust building and it's it's not at all something like someone with an MBA do something smart and then there's a deal it doesn't work that way it just takes lots of trust building and asking people like maybe sometimes drinking together Chamath Palihapitiya: the beauty company and you have to go to the beauty company explain what you're doing and then listen to them and build a trusted relationship SPEAKER_287: and after they all go in parallel yes SPEAKER_09: I think it's very important and then what we figured out is that when it SPEAKER_06: build trust trust on their side of the business you build trust with them then they can take what you've done and give it to their customers SPEAKER_291: but SPEAKER_06: they have to trust you first I I've learned this lesson also in the Middle East when I first started going to the Middle East they said it's a very family dynamic and people want to build a relationship then do business SPEAKER_296: in SPEAKER_06: America you do business you do a deal SPEAKER_296: and SPEAKER_06: then you decide if you want to be friends and I think in Japan you become friends as you're doing business it's three different cultures it's all slightly different in America everybody fights to be an investor in your company we become investors and then maybe we become friends or not maybe I'll just be very distant and you have other ones they send you when you have a baby clothes with the name of the venture Chamath Palihapitiya: capital firm that backed you Sequoia would send a onesie so when we had our baby they send a cute onesie with the Sequoia capital on it I thought it was very cute very fun but I think we now have a framework do a deal build a relationship SPEAKER_06: build a relationship that's America and then Japan maybe build a relationship as you're building a business together and then maybe in the Middle East in Saudi UAE it's get to know each other then build the business very interesting different in each case I don't know about Europe I don't think they're building businesses there anymore okay so tell us your question your name your company and SPEAKER_308: that I'm quite curious about because we also do open source community so one is how did the open source community react to your company's commercialization SPEAKER_312: oh SPEAKER_07: good question yes so you had the open source community for 10 years plus and then you made a SPEAKER_13: for profit how did they respond from the early phase we had this overall SPEAKER_09: framework of how things should be like this open source community doing bio art and visionary visioneering and then we have this non-profit organization speaking with academia and maybe the government then there's this for-profit entity that does physical infrastructure therefore like IP how to make open how to scale proprietary and we overall framework already like shown from SPEAKER_16: early phase so a lot of the members it wasn't a surprise for most of SPEAKER_13: the members got it it's a good communication yeah okay next question clear vision in a way very clear yeah SPEAKER_308: what was the impact of the open source angle when you were raising from VCs they SPEAKER_20: didn't really care to be honest yeah so SPEAKER_16: because it's not the they knew that it's not this initial IP that really matters it will be more about the SPEAKER_09: IP to be generated as the company operates yes yeah SPEAKER_256: I think we've seen that many times open source project WordPress powers a lot of SPEAKER_217: web my friend Matt Mullen created it and everybody was using it but he made the commercial version and hosted version and so VCs were like yeah if a bunch of open source people want to go through the trouble of forking it or standing it SPEAKER_321: my question is around like SPEAKER_324: are you working with organizations like NASA or JAXA to do this type of like culture in space because that would be actually a really great use case because getting protein to the astronauts especially if they're on the moon such a good question yeah SPEAKER_328: because you can't bring cows to space yet SPEAKER_126: yeah so the very short succinct answer will be yes it's like more specifically SPEAKER_09: the cabinet office moonshot not moonshot the other one stardust project and this potential application in space is also what led us to get into seed run funding mainly as an open source project I was pitching for the potential space application of this technology and that made it to like television broadcast and our professor in Tokyo Women's Medical University expert in regional medicine he's also a space enthusiast and he decided to call us in to Tokyo Women's Medical University we got there and basically we agreed to work together so we now have SPEAKER_16: a very like prestigious advisor working with us and that basically led to the seed round SPEAKER_334: great so you built up SPEAKER_117: your credibility and then were able to raise did you raise from American VCs Japanese based VCs or both SPEAKER_126: in 2018 in the seed round we raised SPEAKER_09: raised on Japanese VCs and even the government backed VC as well sovereign VC I would say sure yeah and because of our administrative capability shortcomings we couldn't take international ones although one of the international VCs said yes that it was kind of oversubscribed so but in the series A and the next one 2020 we got AgFounder on board and also Venture University partners great awesome SPEAKER_340: all right one more question hello I'm Howard from LFAOS we build the student record for tutoring agencies my question is that in traditional meets or even for process meet there's a certain hierarchy that is based on both cost and also public perception do you think this hierarchy would exist for cultivated lab processed meet and what do you make of this trend yeah so SPEAKER_341: it will SPEAKER_09: be more of a future stuff because we will be talking about the mainstream phase so I have to admit that it will be a bit of a fantasy that I'm going to say but I think it will be a separate category at least those existing brand owners don't want sell cultured versions to get into their field so it will SPEAKER_16: inevitably sell cultured meet will be outside the existing hierarchy and like then comes the questions like should another and as of now Ministry of Agriculture Forest SPEAKER_09: and Fishery or math in Japan they are refraining from calling it meat got it sell cultured food SPEAKER_282: got it so that's great question yeah I think we had in America I think it was Chamath Palihapitiya: Burger King somebody can look it up Bianca I think it might have been Burger King that had either Beyond Meat or the Impossible Burger maybe you know SPEAKER_348: it was Chamath Palihapitiya: Impossible Burger and do they still do it I wonder they do yeah I think it's been successful SPEAKER_282: hamburger I think is the Holy Grail if you can make a great hamburger that's going to be amazing maybe 10 years SPEAKER_341: yeah so because it will be a commodity product so it takes time to get the price point but that is SPEAKER_81: the Holy Grail yes SPEAKER_351: and it could be healthier yeah SPEAKER_06: and it could be designed to Chamath Palihapitiya: helps you lose weight what's it called Coca-Cola special I just SPEAKER_70: got it at 7-11 I'm sure that someone in America has decided to dope coke with GLP-1 or something yeah SPEAKER_03: no this is Coca-Cola though with fiber in it somebody look it up and tell me the name SPEAKER_06: wow incredible so we just heard the impossible whopper is one of their most successful it's at a white label this Coca-Cola SPEAKER_03: Coca-Cola plus has anybody tried it raise your hand if you have what do you think it's incredible I had it and it Coke zero tastes like better SPEAKER_06: than Coke Diet Coke it's like more syrupy and delicious and then Coke what's this one called plus Coca-Cola plus has I think fiber in it and no calories and you lose weight from it as I drank it I was working last night I was a little bit late and I had a Coca-Cola plus on ice and I said SPEAKER_93: oh if they had this in America I would be even slimmer like a model like a fashion model slim I would be like runway slim you could try for a K-pop star then we could start a K-pop SPEAKER_10: band together we would be incredible SPEAKER_06: yeah you could be the nerdy I could be a sporty K-pop member we have how many members do we need three more you need five right possibly possibly five we could be like the old entrepreneurial SPEAKER_117: K-pop band all right listen this has been a pleasure I wish you great success let's give a round of applause to Dr. Yuki thank you okay SPEAKER_03: and we'll see you next time on this week in startups from Japan