The Venture Codex

Participated · Series B · Sep 2025

Tenchijin merges satellite big data with proprietary AI algorithms to deliver insights that make invisible ground-level risks and value visible. Its core product, the water-utility digital-transformation service “Uchū Suidokyoku,” launched in April 2023 and has already been adopted by numerous municipalities, surpassing 50 cumulative contracts by September 2025. Beyond water infrastructure, the company is extending its technology stack to agriculture and renewable-energy applications and is even developing its own satellites to build an end-to-end data platform. The newly raised funds will be directed toward hiring engineers, enhancing satellite-data analysis and water-resource-monitoring algorithms, expanding domestic and international sales networks, and strengthening its multi-satellite cloud data infrastructure. Branding and market-awareness initiatives are also planned. Headquartered in Tokyo’s Nihonbashi district, Tenchijin positions its mission as “optimizing human civilization through space big data.” Including the latest round, its total funding—equity and debt—now stands at roughly ¥1.9 billion.

Participated · Series A · Mar 2024

IDDK has developed a novel Micro Imaging Device (MID) that fuses optical and semiconductor technologies to enable a fundamentally different form of microscopic observation. The company is building automated space bio-experiment equipment centered on MID as its core technology. IDDK aims to create Japan’s first privately led low‑Earth‑orbit (LEO) space bio-experiment platform, with demonstration flights planned in 2024 and service launch targeted for 2025. It plans to offer MID-based microscopy "anytime, anywhere, by anyone," extending capabilities into microgravity and other special environments. IDDK is pursuing partnerships to expand applications into education, medical and healthcare fields and is also considering commercial space-station platforms in view of the ISS retirement around 2030. The company says it will use new funding to develop next‑generation MID devices and to strengthen its organizational capabilities to scale the business. IDDK has developed a novel Micro Imaging Device (MID) that fuses optical and semiconductor technologies to enable a compact, one-chip microscopy approach used as the core of automated space-bio experiment hardware. The company is building a private-led low-Earth-orbit space bio-experiment platform and plans an in-orbit demonstration in 2024 with commercial services starting in 2025. MID is designed to be lightweight and compact so microscopy can be performed aboard small satellites, enabling lower-cost experiments outside special facilities like the ISS. IDDK also targets commercial space-station platforms after the ISS retirement around 2030 to expand customers and applications. Financially, IDDK completed a pre-Series A first close of ¥240M and has raised a cumulative ¥450M in equity from the seed round through this close. The company plans to use the funds to develop next-generation MID devices, strengthen its organization, and accelerate business and partnership development domestically and internationally.