“Japanese interest in the Israeli ecosystem has increased and we think this will continue”

“We help Israeli startups to grow, obviously in the Israeli market, and when they go out instead of running to the U.S. market, we help them to explore Asian possibilities, and especially the Japanese market,” explained Moshe Sarfaty, Managing Partner at Aristagora VC, speaking to CTech during the Israel-Japan Conference in Tokyo.

Aristagora VC is an early-stage venture capital fund backed mainly by investors from Japan.

“Most of our investors are Japanese and we have definitely seen an increased interest in the Israeli ecosystem in recent years. We definitely think this will continue to increase over time,” added Sarfaty. “Japanese investors as a whole are looking for deep tech companies. They are less interested in less sophisticated solutions.”

Sarfaty spoke of the effects of the global macroeconomic situation on the investment sector. “I think Japan is a different story than the rest of the world. It has been an interest zero environment for the last couple of years. I don’t think the Japanese market has been affected by the downtrend we see in the U.S. and also in the Israeli market. But on the other hand, the Japanese market has experienced the decreasing valuation of the yen compared to the U.S. dollar which has definitely had an effect.”

You can watch the full interview in the video above.