Asia Pacific Initiative (API) is pleased to announce that UMADA Takaaki, Director of FoundX, The University of Tokyo, joined our institution on July 1, 2021, as a Senior Visiting Fellow.

< Profile of UMADA Takaaki>
UMADA Takaaki is Director of FoundX, The University of Tokyo, Japan, where he has engaged himself in supporting startups and educating on entrepreneurship since 2019. Prior to that, he worked for Microsoft Japan and Hongo Tech Garage at The University of Tokyo. He graduated from University of Toronto.

His publications include the book “Paradoxical Startup Thinking” (2017), which explains how to start a startup and how to think about startup ideas, as well as “Environment Design for Successful Entrepreneurs” (2019), which accumulates knowledge on how to grow an environment for entrepreneurs.　He is also the author of “Equipping the Future (Mirai wo Jisso suru)” (2021), a product of API’s project on the social implementation of technology. His slides about startups are viewed about one million times per year and he actively publishes articles on Medium about startups.

< About API >
Established in July 2017, Asia Pacific Initiative (API) is a think tank and forum which aims to uphold and strengthen the liberal international order in the Asia-Pacific so as to maintain peace and prosperity in the region.

API’s Mission Statement

• Liberalism – We will aim to realize a liberal and open society and world where individual initiatives are valued
• Innovation – We will advance society through innovation
• Policy Entrepreneurship – We will foster policy entrepreneurship that will set agendas and pursue policy imagination for the public