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Introducing Fukuoka City's support services for startups!

Global Startup Center & Trial Good Product Certification Business!

Introducing Fukuoka City's support services for startups!

3 min read

1. Global Startup Center

What is the Global Startup Center?

Fukuoka City established the popular Startup Cafe to help local entrepreneurs get their companies up and running. This space acts as a hub for entrepreneurs to meet and exchange ideas while getting advice from the Cafe’s expert staff. The Startup Cafe has always been a great way for both local and foreign entrepreneurs to get the help they need, but the city thought that the growing community could use more tailored resources. This initiative was sparked when Fukuoka City officials began to notice the increasing need for fluent English support, and they saw that the requests for consultations by startup founders from abroad were growing. To accommodate these foreign founders, the city developed the Global Startup Center (GSC) in 2017. The GSC is a place that provides English speakers full access to the resources and information they need. It’s about a lot more than just translating relevant documents into a language founders will understand. At the GSC, you’ll get comprehensive support and make the connections you need to establish your business.

Support available at the Global Startup Center

Get everything right the first time by consulting the GSC. They’re here to help you with everything you need from answering questions to assisting with tougher tasks that require more dedicated support. For example, if you think you qualify for the Startup Visa, they can help to guide you through the application process. Staff members at the GSC can also assist you in some of the daily concerns you might have when living in Japan like renting a home or office space or opening a Japanese bank account. Basically, the GSC and its expert staff will allow you to do more than you ever thought possible. Don’t hesitate to stop by and see just how important they can be to founding your business. Working with the GSC will give you more time to focus on the work you enjoy and give you the peace of mind knowing that you have correctly completed each step within the founding process.

Global Startup Center has a new member!

We are pleased to announce that a new member, Mr. Shun, has joined the GSC staff this year! He is trilingual in German, English and Japanese, and has experience in entrepreneurship. Please feel free to contact him if you are a German speaker!

2. Trial Good Product Certification Business

What is the Fukuoka City Trial Good Product Certification Business?
Fukuoka City certifies excellent new products and services sold or offered by startup companies in Fukuoka City, and supports the development of sales channels through PR and other means. Certified services may lead to orders from City Hall.

The application period and the process of certification are as follows.
Period: April 1, 2022 - March 31, 2023 (certification is granted twice a year)
Call for applicants → Document review → Hearing of opinions from experts, etc. → Determination of certified business operators and certified products

We received a comment from a previously certified startup company, Qurate, about the benefits of receiving the Trial Good Product Certification for their business development!

- What is the overview of the certified services?
The "Qurate® Platform" brings content together in context and in one place. Allowing brands to deliver personalized experiences to their customers by mapping out every piece of content they need for each step of their customer journeys.

- What are the advantages of being certified?
We were certified by Fukuoka City as an excellent service, which helped to give large companies confidence in our service. In addition, thanks to the government's PR efforts through the Fukuoka City website and other means, we were able to develop our sales channels to big corporates and governments.

In addition, Fukuoka City periodically holds exhibitions at City Hall to introduce certified products.

Fukuoka City provides various supports for startups from overseas, such as startup visas, in addition to sales channel development support through this program.

Please follow us on our social media accounts.

In addition to sending out newsletters via email, we also send out information about Fukuoka's startup ecosystem on Facebook and LinkedIn in English.
Please follow us using the links below. You can also go to each of our social media pages from our website. (https://startup.fukuoka.jp/).

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/startupcityfukuoka/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupcityfukuoka/