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I just got my visa for 1 year running a company here. I setup the company to be distributed. I am based in Tokyo. I can say despite not speaking the language it

I just got my visa for 1 year running a company here. I setup the company to be distributed. I am based in Tokyo. I can say despite not speaking the language it was the best decision I have ever made. Both locals and expats are friendly. If you are going to do business here it is best to have someone on your team who speaks the language though. Another big reason I love it here is how safe it is. After having lived in SF for a few years, there's a lot to be said for that. Re: being difficult. I would disagree. Moving to Japan and dealing with immigration took me 4 months and multiple lawyers. The bureaucracy is real.

dvcrn 10y ago
Are you talking about the normal startup visa here that's valid for 1 year? I wasn't aware that it's this annoying to get. From my understanding, you have to hand in the papers (with a basic business plan), incorporate your company and after a year, proof that you indeed make money. For all other visas you just need a sponsor (company) / proof that you can make money as a freelancer and, well, a university degree. Japan might even be one of the only countries that effectively lets you skip the university degree (and 10 years of work experience) requirement with the right certificate that should be no problem to get if you know your computer science basics
- agibsonccc 10y ago
  I did an intra company transfer with an already existing subsidiary. In our case we are venture funded with a seed round in the millions. The devil here is in the details. We also have a deal with jetro: http://jetro.go.jp/usa/topics/companies-chosen-global-innovation-centers-subsidy-announced.html http://jetro.go.jp/usa/topics/companies-chosen-global-innova... as well as a ton of Japanese PR which helped. Half of our difficulty was actually finding a good law firm that understood how software companies work.

dvcrn 10y ago

Are you talking about the normal startup visa here that's valid for 1 year? I wasn't aware that it's this annoying to get. From my understanding, you have to hand in the papers (with a basic business plan), incorporate your company and after a year, proof that you indeed make money. For all other visas you just need a sponsor (company) / proof that you can make money as a freelancer and, well, a university degree. Japan might even be one of the only countries that effectively lets you skip the university degree (and 10 years of work experience) requirement with the right certificate that should be no problem to get if you know your computer science basics

agibsonccc 10y ago
I did an intra company transfer with an already existing subsidiary. In our case we are venture funded with a seed round in the millions. The devil here is in the details. We also have a deal with jetro: http://jetro.go.jp/usa/topics/companies-chosen-global-innovation-centers-subsidy-announced.html http://jetro.go.jp/usa/topics/companies-chosen-global-innova... as well as a ton of Japanese PR which helped. Half of our difficulty was actually finding a good law firm that understood how software companies work.