Co-creation among CEOs, VCs, and support partners to accelerate startup business growth

"STARTUP GROWTH TALK" is a series in which Dentsu Inc. members who support startup growth join forces with entrepreneurs, business leaders, and investors to explore the realities of business growth.

In this installment, Hiroshi Ichikawa, CEO of Facilo—a company tackling digital transformation (DX ) in the real estate brokerage sector — joined Emre Hidekazu Yuasa, Partner at Globis Capital Partners (GCP), and Yuki Hase of Dentsu Inc. Startup Growth Partners (SGP) for a roundtable discussion.

Centered on the ambitious initiative to “promote behavioral change among real estate brokerage firms by leveraging consumer-facing promotions,” the three discussed the behind-the-scenes story of how they met and have worked together to accelerate business growth.

[Facilo Co., Ltd.]

A startup with the vision of “Making moving easier, making life more vibrant,” aiming to streamline real estate transactions in Japan and make moving a more accessible option. The company develops and provides “Facilo,” a real estate communication cloud that centralizes and visualizes the real estate transaction process via the cloud, maximizing the value of sales while improving the quality of the customer experience.

Facilo’s Challenge: Redesigning the Real Estate Brokerage “Experience”

Hase: I’m in close contact with both of you on a regular basis, so I’m truly honored to have this opportunity to sit down and talk with you in depth like this! I hope this roundtable discussion will provide some insights into business growth and promotion for startups and those who support them. I’m a little nervous sitting here in front of two people I respect so much (laughs), but I’d be happy if we could keep things light and enjoyable.

First, could you please tell us again about Facilo’s business?

Ichikawa: Facilo is a startup that develops and provides SaaS solutions for real estate brokerage firms. We were founded in 2021 and have just entered our fifth fiscal year. Our product not only streamlines administrative and backend operations for brokerage firms but also features a system that delivers the information gathered there to property buyers and sellers in an easy-to-understand format. I believe what sets Facilo apart is our ability to not only improve brokerage firms’ productivity but also support the end-user customer experience.

Hase: When I first actually tried the product, I thought it was incredibly easy to use! I was so impressed by the high quality of the UI/UX that I even found myself thinking, “I wish I’d had this when I was buying my own home.”

Ichikawa: I’m glad to hear that! Currently, adoption is spreading from major firms to community-based real estate agencies, with approximately 2,500 branches and around 15,000 active users. I suspect that for anyone searching for a property in Tokyo, the number of cases where they’re receiving proposals via Facilo’s My Page without even realizing it is increasing significantly.

Hase: So it’s becoming quite a familiar presence. Could you tell us a bit about your career so far, Mr. Ichikawa?

Ichikawa: I joined Recruit right out of college and was assigned to the SUUMO division. I started in sales and later gained experience in product development, corporate planning, and business development. I was there for about eight years.

After that, in 2016, I moved to San Francisco, USA, and joined the real estate tech company Movoto. In addition to being involved in management as CFO, I was also responsible for launching a real estate brokerage firm. We worked on an end-to-end business model that provided a seamless customer experience, covering everything from the initial property search to the actual move.

That company exited via an M&A deal in 2020, and while I was involved in post-merger integration (PMI) for a while, I eventually decided I wanted to launch my own business. So, I returned to Japan and founded Facilo.

Hase: Hearing about your background, it’s clear there was a natural progression leading to your current business. Next, please go ahead, Mr. Emure.

Emre: We are an independent VC based in Japan, currently managing a fund worth 70 billion yen.We have invested in over 200 startups to date, focusing on the technology and internet sectors, regardless of whether they are B2B or B2C. We serve as board members for many of our portfolio companies and provide long-term, stage-appropriate support all the way through to exits such as IPOs and M&A. We led Facilo’s Series A round in 2024, and I serve as an outside director, helping to resolve management challenges.

GCP aims to become a platform that consistently creates companies with market capitalizations exceeding 100 billion yen. In this context, encountering a company like Facilo—which is seriously committed to driving evolution within a major industry—is incredibly exciting for us and a truly rewarding moment.

Hase: Hearing you say it again, GCP really does have a top-tier scale...!We at Dentsu Inc. Startup Growth Partners (SGP) are a specialized team dedicated to supporting startups, accompanying them from a business, marketing, and communications perspective as they progress through their growth phases. Rather than proposing one-off initiatives, our hallmark is providing medium- to long-term support—from identifying challenges to execution. We deeply engage with the business to serve as a driving force, helping startups advance to their next stage of growth.

A Huge Market, a Strong Team, and a Promising Product: GCP’s Perspective on Facilo’s Potential

Hase: Next, I’d like to ask about how you and Emre met. Did the two of you meet in the U.S.?

Emre: No, it was in Japan, wasn’t it?

Ichikawa: Yes. It was about a year or two after I returned from the U.S. and launched Facilo. Actually, while I was living in the U.S., I was posting information about local real estate tech on a blog, and I later found out that Emre had been reading it.

Hase: So that blog was how you first met.

Emre: That’s right. While researching the real estate tech sector, I came across Mr. Ichikawa’s blog. When I thought about contributing to the creation of unicorn companies in Japan, I realized I needed to focus on a major industry first. In that regard, the real estate industry is a very attractive market, so I was keeping a close eye on it. And even within that sector, I noticed Mr. Ichikawa’s content right away and thought, “There’s someone doing something interesting here.”

Hase: So, what led to us actually meeting? Was it around the time of your funding round?

Ichikawa: Yes. I was introduced to you by another VC during our 2022 seed round. Since we were still in the startup phase at the time, I thought we might be a bit out of GCP’s usual focus—which is primarily Series A and beyond—but they connected us with an eye toward the future.

Emre: In our investment decisions, we prioritize three key factors: “market, team, and product.” Facilo was very attractive in terms of both the market and the team, but regarding the product, we wanted to assess how it would actually be received in the market. We continued to communicate regularly and track progress, and when we felt the time was right, we decided to lead the Series A investment.

Hase: How big was Facilo’s team back then?

Ichikawa: When I first met Emre, it was about five or six people. Even at the time of the Series A investment, it was only around 12 people.

Hase: I see. What specific factors led you to conclude that the team was a good fit at that time?

Emre: I believe that what’s crucial in DX is the combination of industry expertise and product development capabilities. An industry like real estate brokerage is highly specialized and consists of a group of professionals, so superficial industry knowledge simply won’t cut it. It’s also important to have a team with a deep understanding of the industry that can implement solutions to its challenges using technology. I felt that Facilo possessed both of these qualities.

Ichikawa: At the time, development was handled by CTO Umebayashi and a few engineers. Since Umebayashi was still living in San Francisco, we divided development between Japan and the U.S., creating a system where work progressed almost 24 hours a day due to the time difference. We were moving the project forward at quite a pace—feedback received from clients in the evening would be implemented by the next morning (laughs).

Emre: That’s amazing. I get the impression that kind of speed and commitment to product improvement hasn’t changed even now.

Ichikawa: Yes, that’s an area we’re very particular about. I feel that our clients evaluate us not only based on the current quality of the product but also on the expectation that “if improvements continue at this pace, it will only get better in the future.”

Hase: We were amazed by that speed while working with you. Chat responses are quick, and the management team makes decisions fast, so we felt we couldn’t afford to fall behind (laughs).

Ichikawa: For a startup, speed is the number one differentiator, so we’re very conscious of that as an organization. We’ve reduced the number of regular meetings, banned PowerPoint for internal presentations, and implemented various measures to ensure we can focus on our most important core tasks.

Emre: I found that culture, among other things, to be very appealing.

Hase: On the flip side, what was your impression of GCP, Ichikawa?

Ichikawa: Since they’re one of Japan’s top-tier VCs, I thought it might be a bit too early for us—being an early-stage company—to meet with them. But when we actually met, I was impressed by how flat and approachable the atmosphere was, and how seriously they engaged with us from the very beginning.

Hase: That led to your investment decision—what was the deciding factor?

Emre: Basically, we make our decisions based on the three factors I mentioned earlier—"market, team, and product"—but the product’s appeal was particularly strong.In fact, in the year or so since our first meeting, adoption by companies had been progressing at a remarkable pace. The strength of Facilo’s product lies not only in streamlining existing operations but also in creating new value through improved customer experience and increased revenue. A product that goes beyond operational efficiency to directly contribute to revenue is highly attractive from an investment perspective. We could clearly sense that potential, so we thought, “We definitely want to partner with them.”

Hase: What was the actual reaction from real estate agencies like? I had the impression that the industry might have strong resistance to technology...

Ichikawa: We’ve received a very positive response. One reason for this is that we didn’t design the system to drastically overhaul existing workflows. When people hear “digitalization,” they often imagine completely replacing existing methods, but that approach rarely takes root on the ground. Facilo is designed with a deep understanding of the workflows that have long been in place in real estate brokerage, making each step more convenient and intuitive.

In fact, some managers who were deciding whether to adopt the system even told me—in a good way—"I wish I’d had this when I was in sales!" or "If I’d had this, I could have achieved even better results!" (laughs). We’ve also received feedback from salespeople on the front lines saying things like, "It really hits the spot," and "This is exactly what I wanted."

Hase: That’s a great response! By the way, Mr. Emre, you’ve been involved as an outside director since Series A. How do you support the company?

Emre: Basically, we discuss business progress and decision-making at our monthly board meetings. Since speed of decision-making is crucial for startups, we discuss the topics brought up by Mr. Ichikawa on the spot. In addition, we provide resources as needed, such as support for hiring.

The Candid Discussion That Started with “Why Don’t We Stop the TV Commercials?”

Hase: I met Mr. Ichikawa around the end of 2024, right? It all started when Emre’s team reached out and said, “We’d really like you to meet him.” But what was the background behind this conversation in the first place?

Ichikawa: It started with us thinking about “how to accelerate our next phase of growth.” By 2024, our team had expanded from 12 to about 50 people, and our product was growing steadily. However, we also felt a sense of urgency—we needed a strategy to drive even more growth.

That’s when we started thinking about approaches beyond traditional B2B sales. We were seeing cases where end-users considering property purchases would show the Facilo interface to real estate agencies and ask, “Can’t you use this?” and nearly all of those inquiries led to actual orders. The starting point was wondering if we could intentionally create that kind of momentum. By raising awareness among end-users, we wanted to create a situation where agencies using Facilo would be the ones chosen. The idea was to use B2C as a starting point to drive B2B.

However, since B2C promotion isn’t our area of expertise, we were looking for a partner who could help us figure that out—that was the sequence of events.

Emre: This challenge is common to many B2B startups, not just Facilo.While we can approach large corporations directly, expanding into small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and regional markets is difficult. How to break through that barrier has been a constant topic of discussion for us as VCs. As one potential solution, the approach of “channeling B2C back into B2B” is intriguing, and if successful, it could potentially be applied to our other portfolio companies. With those expectations in mind, we consulted Dentsu Inc., which specializes in supporting startup promotions.

Hase: I remember being really happy when you reached out to us. To be honest, I’d been a huge fan of Emure’s podcast for a while, so I never expected you’d actually consult with us directly (laughs).

We were so enthusiastic—"We’ll do anything!"—that we put a team together right away, but our first priority was simply understanding the industry. Since we knew nothing about the real estate sector, we interviewed my younger brother, who works at a real estate firm, to learn about the realities on the ground, and we even visited local real estate agencies in person. We then approached our initial proposal with a set of hypotheses. The major point of contention at that time was, "Should we run TV commercials?"

Ichikawa: That’s right—that was definitely the first turning point.

Hase: You had approached us saying, “We want to do TV commercials,” but in our initial proposal, we suggested, “Why don’t we skip the TV commercials?” Since that effectively contradicted your request, I was actually quite nervous inside…

Ichikawa: I see. That was actually the point where I trusted you the most. To be honest, at first I was worried: “How seriously will Dentsu Inc. take a startup like us?” But in reality, after conducting thorough, down-to-earth research, you clearly told us, “I don’t think TV commercials are the right move right now.” That came across as very positive, and it was one of the deciding factors that made me think, “I want to work with this team.”

Hase: I’m relieved to hear you say that…! For us, too, the goal wasn’t simply to create and air TV commercials; we were thinking based on whether it would lead to business growth. That’s why, in our initial proposal, we focused mainly on B2B initiatives.

Ichikawa: Yes. We also wanted to respond to your sincere attitude, so we were quite candid in our feedback on your proposal. We told you, “We’ll handle the B2B side ourselves, so we’d like Dentsu Inc. to focus on the B2C strategy and creative work.” I did wonder if I was being a bit too direct, but since we were having such an open discussion, I decided to convey our thoughts straightforwardly.

Hase: From our perspective, we were truly grateful that you were able to be so clear about that right there in the meeting. Thanks to that, we were able to make up our minds and focus on planning the “B2C2B” strategy, and I feel like the project really took off from there.

Contributing to Business Growth with Proactive Creativity Born from Co-creation

Hase: From here, I’d like to look back on how the project actually progressed. To be honest, this initiative was quite challenging, wasn’t it?

Emre: That’s right. Instead of following the standard B2B marketing playbook, we aimed to start with communication with consumers and use that to drive behavioral change among brokerage firms. For us, too, this was an approach we had almost no experience with among our portfolio companies. While it could have been a fantastic use case if it worked, we didn’t know if it would actually succeed until we tried it.

Hase: We also felt the difficulty level was quite high. That’s precisely why we focused on the overall design: “Who should we communicate with, what should we convey, and how do we want to change their behavior?”We created a campaign website to help consumers understand Facilo’s value, and from there, we designed a step-by-step journey from awareness to understanding to action by combining web commercials, PR press conferences, social media campaigns, and content distribution on NewsPicks. We also proposed ways to reach real estate brokerage firms, including flyers and videos they could use in-store.

Ichikawa: At first, I was completely open-minded—I wasn’t even sure if we were actually going to proceed. But when you showed us the creative concepts during the initial proposal phase, I felt strongly that “this is worth doing.”

Once we entered the execution phase, you took the lead on a wide range of tasks—from designing the PR event to producing web commercials, casting, filming, and managing the progress of each initiative. It was impressive how Mr. Hase acted as the hub, keeping everything running smoothly.

Hase: In addition to our weekly meetings, we had quite a few subcommittee sessions, didn’t we? We broke down the tasks into small steps and moved forward while checking progress frequently.

Ichikawa: Since we were running multiple initiatives in parallel over a very short period, that project management was a huge help. Mr. Hase practically acted like a full-time employee, didn’t he? (laughs)

Emre: I heard Facilo’s COO, Mr. Asaoka, say many times that “Mr. Hase is working just like a full-time employee” (laughs).

Hase: That makes me so happy…! I was running around as if I were actually a Facilo employee myself, so that’s really encouraging! It was also incredibly easy for me to work with you because both Mr. Ichikawa and Mr. Asaoka made decisions on the spot. I believe it was precisely because we had a relationship where we could discuss things honestly that we were able to move forward smoothly and with a sense of urgency, despite the tight schedule.

Ichikawa: The final creative work turned out great, too. The web commercial featuring Batteries really left an impression on me.This time, we faced the challenge of conveying the inconveniences of buying real estate to the general public without mocking our actual clients—the brokerage firms. I think the unique concept of “poking one’s head out of a mountain of paper” and Ace’s character, who “says sharp things with pure sincerity,” worked perfectly together. It’s entertaining for the general public, and industry insiders can relate to it as “so true”—I’m glad we managed to walk that fine line.

In fact, we’ve received a steady stream of feedback from real estate brokerage professionals saying things like, “We want to hand out these flyers” or “We want to play the commercial in our stores.” It was gratifying to see such a positive response from the B2B side, even though this was a B2C campaign.

Emure: I think it really resonated with the brokerage firms as well. It effectively articulated the frustrations they’ve long felt about paper-based processes—problems they’ve been aware of but haven’t been able to change.

Ichikawa: That’s right. We saw clear changes, such as an increase in the conversion rate for ongoing deals and a rise in inquiries. Of course, the world didn’t change overnight, but I think it was a major step forward in terms of our impact on the market.

Hase: That’s truly wonderful to hear. As SGP, our greatest achievement is seeing this contribute to the progress of our business.

Emre: From an investor’s perspective, seeing tangible results is crucial. This initiative has had a positive impact on brand awareness and our win rate, and it’s made it easier to make future investment decisions. There’s still significant untapped potential in the market, so seeing that these kinds of strategies work is a major plus.

Ichikawa: Additionally, for our company, the fact that we were able to see this project through to the end was significant in itself. I feel that the experience of executing a promotion on this scale, involving the entire company, has definitely strengthened our organization.

Advancing Japan’s DX Through Co-creation Among Startups, Investors, and Support Partners

Hase: By collaborating on this project, we’ve gained a lot of valuable insights and a real sense of the impact of initiatives that bridge B2C and B2B. With that in mind, I’d love to hear how you plan to expand from here. Mr. Ichikawa, could you tell us about Facilo’s vision for the future?

Ichikawa: Our company’s vision is “Make moving easier, make life more vibrant.” The reality is that moving homes in Japan still involves significant hurdles, but I believe it should be a much more common choice. Especially as the supply of new homes becomes increasingly difficult to maintain, the importance of the pre-owned housing market is bound to grow even further.

On the other hand, real estate transactions are highly complex, involving not only sellers and buyers but also multiple players such as selling and buying brokers. Our major goal is to use technology and AI to make this process a simpler and more intuitive experience.

We have launched four products so far, and moving forward, we plan to expand our product lineup while addressing the challenges on the ground one by one.

Hase: Thank you. Next, Emre, from an investor’s perspective, please tell us what you expect to see in the future.

Emre: I don’t believe the challenges Facilo is tackling can be resolved with a single product. To streamline the entire real estate transaction process, we need to take a long-term approach, adding products as needed and venturing into new business areas. In that context, I expect you to tackle this field head-on and see it through to the end.

Furthermore, I feel this initiative offers insights that extend beyond a single company and contribute to Japan’s overall digital transformation (DX). B2B startups tend to focus their reach on large corporations and urban areas, but that alone won’t drive transformation across society as a whole. I believe it’s of great value that we’ve identified a way to reach segments that traditional sales methods couldn’t reach, as we’ve seen in this case.

While startups possess tremendous strength in product development, there is still room for growth when it comes to how they deliver those products. I hope that everyone at Dentsu Inc. SGP will accumulate insights and know-how through initiatives like this one and share them with other startups. How can we deliver products to more companies? How can we accelerate DX across Japan as a whole? As a VC, it would be very reassuring if you could become a “hub of insights” to achieve these goals.

Hase: Thank you. Using initiatives like this as a model, we aim to accelerate growth by uniting startups, investors, and supporting partners. I hope we can continue to expand these kinds of relationships in the future.

Emre: That’s right. It would be great if we could create a model that delivers value to everyone involved. Corporate productivity increases, the user experience improves, and as a result, society as a whole benefits. We want to create that kind of virtuous cycle.

Hase: We’re committed to continuing to support Facilo’s future challenges, and we hope to apply the insights gained from this experience to support the growth of even more startups. Thank you very much for your time today!