![]() ![]() SmartNews is backed by the Yamauchi No 10 Family Office, the investment firm that manages the wealth of the family behind gaming giant Nintendo and says it wants to change Japan. The SmartNews app had been downloaded 50-million times globally as of the summer of 2019, while monthly active users had reached 20-million, it said. It’s also a rare example of a Japanese technology venture making inroads into the US market, where users doubled in 2020, according to the company. SmartNews, which uses an algorithm to provide what it says is an unbiased, nonpartisan mix of information, raised $230m last month at a valuation of $2bn, making it one of Japan’s most valuable start-ups. He created a company that aims to give people objective news. More than two decades later, he tried to do something about barriers and unfairness. “It made me think about why such absurd walls have to exist.” “It was such a huge shock,” Suzuki said in an interview, speaking of his trip. If they’d waited a few months, he thought, they wouldn’t be dead. Along the way, he saw a memorial for a family who had been shot trying to get to the west. Suzuki, who was 14 years old and on a school trip at the time, was allowed to cross into East Germany because he had a Japanese passport. ![]() It all started, Ken Suzuki says, back in 1989 when he visited the Berlin Wall. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |