Land, Sea, Air × Robotics Startup Pitch
Overview
On August 28, 2025, we co-hosted the “Land, Sea, Air × Robotics DRONE FUND Portfolio Startup Pitch” with Mori Building Co., Ltd. at the “Tokyo Venture Capital Hub” (Azabudai Hills Garden Plaza B).
Attendees were mainly CVCs and business corporations, with over 40 participants in total.
Tokyo Venture Capital Hub: https://www.azabudai-hills.com/tokyo_vc_hub/index.html
Purpose of the Event
Awareness of Challenges in Corporate–Startup Collaboration
- In traditional pitch formats, the essence of technology and its applicable domains are not sufficiently conveyed, often stalling internal discussions. Particularly in deep tech and hardware sectors, the lead time from consideration to adoption is extremely long.
Design Philosophy
- By providing “recommendation comments” for each presenting company, we clarified “what to look for,” reducing the cognitive load on attendees. Through GP follow-up, we translated technical explanations into a business context. Perspectives directly linked to decision-making—such as implementation environments, KPIs, safety, and maintenance systems—were shared during the event. As a result, networking took place after aligning on key discussion points, creating a space for meaningful dialogue beyond mere business card exchange.
Intended Effects
- Shortening lead time to PoC: Established a common language at the initial touchpoint, reducing the number of back-and-forth cycles needed for requirements definition.
- Supporting internal consensus-building: Recommendation comments were aligned at a level of granularity that makes it easier for attendees to explain internally within their companies.
Presenting Companies
As the title suggests, four robotics-related startups in land, sea, and air presented.
- CuboRex (Land): Development, manufacturing, and sales of crawler units and related solutions
https://cuborex.com/ - LOMBY (Land): Efficiency and labor-saving in last-mile delivery through autonomous delivery robots
https://lomby.jp/ - FullDepth (Sea): Providing underwater inspection, data processing, and mapping technologies centered on underwater robotics
https://fulldepth.co.jp/ - VFR (Air): A carve-out from VAIO, formerly Sony’s PC brand. Focused on OEM and ODM businesses in robotics and drones
https://vfr.co.jp/
Features of This Event
Pre-distributed “Recommendation Comments”
- Concise materials summarizing key points, expected use cases, and entry points for collaboration were distributed in advance. This increased the speed of understanding during pitches and raised the resolution of Q&A discussions.
GP Follow-up Immediately After Each Pitch
- Immediately following each pitch, DRONE FUND’s GPs supplemented with insights on technology, markets, and implementation perspectives. This helped organize key issues and advanced the discussion to preconditions for adoption and points for validation design.
Impressions of the Event & Future Plans
The energy in the venue never waned, and many attendees stayed even after the scheduled time ended.
For future events, we plan to:
- Co-host with other VCs
- Jointly curate and edit: Consolidate the perspectives of multiple VCs and expand the lineup across themes.
Contact Information
DRONE FUND Co., Ltd.
Mail: info-nrply@dronefund.vc
