It consists from two initiatives. One is Docomo Innovation Village, a startup support program, which jointly with other supporters provides office space and other environment for several teams selected by judge.
The second is an establishment of a corporate venture fund, Docomo Innovation Fund . Through the fund, it invests in startups from Docomo Innovation Village as well as venture companies having promising services or technologies. It also plans to use the promising services or technologies to improve its services. The amount of the fund is 10 billion yen and the term is to be 10 years. For the fund, the company plans to found a subsidiary for operation.
NTT Docomo has done venture investment through its subsidiary, Docomo.com. It said that it is not certain at this moment, but it would be merged with the new subsidiary.
Cnet Japan 10/26/2012 [jp]
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- Another telecom operator, KDDI launched startup support program, Mugen Labo from August 2011 and established venture fund early this year. This Docomo's initiatives are surely to follow these KDDI's activities. NTT Group has CVC arm, NTT Investment Partners. In addition to Docomo.com, it might have to manage some issues internally in the group.
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