Joe’s background is in IT where he started his career as a software engineer in Japan and then worked with Hitachi. From 2007-2011 Joe was the Manager of Business Development at Hitachi and from 2014-2017 he served as the President and Managing Partner at Recruit Strategic Partners, the CVC vehicle of Recruit Holdings, Japan’s largest HR/media company. Joe was responsible for the investment and portfolio strategy of Recruit Strategic Partners, managing over 100 portfolio companies worldwide (40 of which were based in the US).

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Joe shifted the organization’s geographic focus towards the US market, and successfully invested in 30 startups over a 3.5 year period in San Francisco. Whilst at Recruit Strategic Partners, his most notable investments include Palo Alto Networks(NYSE : PANW), DocuSign(NASDAQ: DOCU), 99designs(Acq’d by Vistaprint), Noom, DataRobot and ShipBob. Joe was responsible for transforming Recruit’s investment arm to a disciplined and agile CVC unit with a fast-decision-making process, thesis and financially driven strategy. Joe also helped Recruit’s portfolio companies develop their businesses in Japan through his network. Joe’s expertise is in B2B SaaS and marketplace technologies.