Team
C. Jeffrey Char, President and CEO
Mr. Char is a serial entrepreneur. He has many years of experience in dealing with market entry and has assisted numerous foreign companies establish operations in Japan. He has also founded a number of his own ventures in Japan and the US, including: maneo, Japan's first social lending service site; Sozon, an online marketing company sold to ValueCommerce; Solis, a domain registrar sold to GMO Internet; SSK Technology, Inc., a printed circuit board company sold to Suzuki Manufacturing; and Pario Software, a network security software company sold to Lucent Technologies. Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Mr. Char worked as a corporate attorney (licensed in the State of California) and as an investment banker.
Mr. Char studied economics at Sophia University in Tokyo and law at the University of California, Berkeley and Harvard Law School.
Tomoko Yoneyama, CFO
Ms. Yoneyama is a certified tax accountant. She is responsible for market entry consulting as well as managing back-office operations at J-Seed and several of the company's portfolio ventures. Prior to joining J-Seed, Ms. Yoneyama worked at Sasajima Tax Accounting Office.
Ms. Yoneyama is a graduate of Rikkyo University in Tokyo.
Nobuyoshi Senga, Director
Mr. Senga spent 36 years of his professional career at Sumitomo 3M where he held various Sales and Marketing positions. In 1993 he was appointed General Manager of the DIY Divine & Commercial Care division and from 2000 on he worked as a Manager within the Customer Technical Center. Since 2005 Mr. Senga has been a Director at J-Seed where he has been involved with various J-Seed portfolio companies.
Carl Kay, Director
Mr. Kay is a Tokyo-based entrepreneur and an expert in the Japanese service sector. He founded and ran a pioneering firm for 15 years which helped American software companies localize products for the Japanese market. His company prospered amidst the rapid growth in demand for software in Japan in the 1990s. In 1998 Mr. Kay sold the company to a larger firm where he continued on in a senior management position at the company’s US NASDAQ IPO in the following year. Since then, he has been consulting, researching, writing and lecturing, in addition to managing a portfolio of angel investments in companies in Japan and North America, including several firms where he serves as a director. As a consultant, Mr. Kay helps service companies develop cross-border marketing, sales and partnerships. He co-authored “Saying Yes to Japan”, a book about Japan’s services sector that was published in English in 2005 and subsequently in Japanese by Nikkei in 2006. Mr. Kay is active on boards of multiple non-profit organizations including the Harvard Club of Japan, where he serves as President.
Mr. Kay is a Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) candidate at the Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, where he researches innovation in the Japanese service sector. He teaches cross-cultural business strategy and serves as an adjunct faculty member at Meiji University. He graduated summa cum laude from Harvard’s Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations in 1978.
Ryo Umezawa, Director
Mr. Umezawa possesses a multi-cultural background with strong industry experience in mobile and online marketing. He has been involved with J-Seed since 2005, participating in several of J-Seed’s partner companies including Sozon and Mobikyo. Mr. Umezawa was a director at Mobikyo and managed their highly successful Mobile Monday Tokyo event. Most recently, he was in charge of starting up an iPhone ad network in Japan. He also writes about venture companies for CNET Japan and helps organize NetTokyo, a major charity networking event held annually in Tokyo.
Mr. Umezawa studied economics at Sophia University in Tokyo and graduated in 2007.
