Japanese TV Shopping Company Quadruples VC Fund to $200M After Early AI Bets Pay Off

Japanet Holdings, the Japanese television shopping company based in Nagasaki, has quadrupled its venture capital fund to $200 million after early investments in Anthropic, xAI, SpaceX, and OpenAI generated returns that made the original $50 million fund look like a rounding error. The expansion, announced on Monday, turns a five-year-old experiment in corporate venture capital into one of the more improbable success stories in AI investing. The fund, launched in March 2021 with Pegasus Tech Ventures as general partner, was initially designed to connect global startups with Japanet's operations in Nagasaki, particularly its $650 million Stadium City development. It was not designed to produce venture-scale returns on artificial intelligence companies. But the fund's early positions in Anthropic and xAI, taken when both were valued at a fraction of their current worth, have appreciated on paper Anthropic was valued at $550 million when it raised its Series A in May 2021. It closed a $30 billion raise in February at a $380 billion valuation and is reportedly fielding offers north of $800 billion. xAI, Elon Musk's AI company, reached a $230 billion valuation in January before being acquired Japanet's path to AI investing starts with a camera shop. Akira Takata, born in Nagasaki in 1948, took over his family's camera store and in 1986 turned it into a mail-order business. He pioneered radio shopping on NBC Nagasaki Broadcasting, then moved to television, and built Japanet Takata into Japan's leading home shopping network. Revenue reached 262 billion yen, roughly $1.7 billion, in fiscal 2023. Akira retired as chief executive in 2015. His son, Akito Takata, now runs Japanet Holdings and its 13 group companies with approximately 2,000 employees. Pegasus Tech Ventures, based in San Jose, California, operates what it calls a "venture capital as a service" model. Founded Japanet's fund expansion is part of a broader pattern of Japanese capital flowing into AI at an accelerating rate. SoftBank has committed $41 billion to OpenAI, lifting its stake to 11 percent and booking a $4.2 billion gain. Japan's government announced a one trillion yen, or $6.34 billion, five-year scheme beginning this fiscal year to back domestic AI development including foundation models. Japan's AI infrastructure spending is projected to surpass $5.5 billion in 2026, a sevenfold increase since 2022, according to IDC. Microsoft has committed $10 billion over four years to Japanese AI infrastructure in partnership with SoftBank and Sakura Internet. The returns that justified the fund expansion are, for now, entirely on paper. Anthropic is private. xAI was absorbed into SpaceX, also private. OpenAI is expected to file for an IPO in the second half of this year but has not yet done so. The positions are illiquid, and the valuations are set