What happened when one Japanese startup talked about women’s sexual health

Disrupting Japan: Startups and Innovation in Japan

Some things are supposed to be only whispered about in Japan. But startups are about breaking taboos and pushing boundaries, and making the world a bit better when they do it. Today's we sit down with Amina Sugimoto of Fermata, and we talk about how quickly and radically the FemTech movement is changing Japan's conversations, attitudes, and even public policy around women's health. It turns out things are both much worse and much better than you probably imagine. It's a great conversation, and I think you'll enjoy it. Show Notes Why VCs have been hesitant to invest in FemTech How FemTech is defined in Japan, and what makes a "FemTech product" FemTech as a B2B business in Japan Japanese enterprise's, hesitant moves into FemTech Discussing sexual pleasure with Isetan's conservative management and customers How the FemTech label is opening up a new conversation about women's health in Japan FemTech as a national movement Why it is hard to get FemTech devices approved in Japan The future of FemTech in Japan What we need in addition to FemTech to really make a difference #WereNotSalmon Links from the Founders Everything you wanted to know about Fermata Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan. Straight Talk from Japan's most successful entrepreneurs. I'm Tim Romero and thanks for joining me. I love it when a conversation takes me by surprise. I usually already know the guests I'm interviewing and I do my research ahead of time. So, I generally know what to expect from these conversations. But every once in a while things head off in a completely different direction and the facts on the ground take me by surprise. Today is one of those conversations. Today we sit down with an Amina Sugimoto, the founder of Japanese FemTech powerhouse Fermata, and we talk about how Japanese attitudes towards women's health are changing and how the FemTech movement is a driving force behind that change. Fermata speaks directly and candidly about topics that Japanese society has always preferred to whisper about. She's worked with industry, government, and consumers to change laws and attitudes and is seeing real progress. Amina and I talk about how to get laws changed in Japan, what happens when women start frank conversations about their health and sexual needs. And what she learned by selling vibrators to Isetan department stores super conservative shoppers. But you know, Amina tells that story much better than I can. So, let's get right to the interview. Interview Tim: So, I'm sitting here with Amina Sugimoto of Fermata, one of the leaders of consumer FemTech in Japan. Amina: Thank you. Tim: And thanks for sitting down with me. Amina: Of course, of course. It's my pleasure. Tim: I gave a really brief explanation of what Fermata is and I’m sure you can do a much better job than I can. So, what is Fermata? Amina: So, we initially started as a research group within the Venture Capital. Tim: Mistletoe, right? Amina: Yeah. Ran by [inaudible 00:02:16]. There is this one company that came across two things that I found out. One is not many venture capitalists were interested in this emerging new technology, our women's health. And then two, there are not many companies that instead of actually focusing on how to actually create industry brand a product, Tim: So, at Mistletoe were you trying to get them to invest in these FemTech companies? And Amina: So initially, yes. I still remember today that we were sitting around in the table and there's one company from the US that's actually called Modern Fertility. Now, what they did is they brought in existing technology of measuring AMA's hormone, which basically we can measure how much eggs we've got left. This technology is available at clinics in the name of marriage checks in Japan. So, basically before you get married, you get the test. And if you can't get pregnant anymore, oftentimes that marriage just no longer.