On November 17th and 18th, 2022, Standage's Executive Vice President and COO, Omori, gave a seminar at the "Overseas Business EXPO Tokyo 2022." Titled "The Era of 'Outsourcing' Trade: How to Start Overseas Expansion from Scratch," he passionately explained everything from why small and medium-sized enterprises should expand overseas now to an overview of his company's trade package service utilizing IT implementation subsidies, incorporating the challenges he experienced during his time working at a general trading company.

 

■ Lecture content (summary)

1. Why "Now"? The weak yen and the government's actions

Recently, Japan has been experiencing a once-in-a-decades depreciation of the yen. While this has various impacts on the economy, from an export perspective, a weaker yen acts as a very advantageous factor.

The government has also presented proactive support measures in its supplementary budget proposal for fiscal year 2022, including wage increases for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and the development of overseas markets. With support of 1 million yen for 10,000 companies expanding overseas, there is a strong tailwind for entering the export business, and Japanese SMEs should not miss this opportunity.

 

2. Hurdles in Exports and the Role of Trading Companies

However, for small and medium-sized enterprises in particular, there are numerous obstacles to entering the trade market.

Because each process, from developing sales channels to negotiations and contracts, payment, and logistics, requires specialized knowledge and language skills, exporting using only in-house resources is extremely difficult.

Trading companies are there to support such companies in developing trade, but large trading companies usually don't have the capacity to handle trade with small and medium-sized enterprises. In fact, Omori himself had experience turning down transactions with small and medium-sized enterprises during his time at Itochu Corporation, which was one of the reasons he started Standage.

 

3. Standage's Trade DX and "Full Outsourcing" Package

Standage offers "DigiTrad," a package service that allows small and medium-sized enterprises aiming to expand their sales channels overseas to outsource all aspects of trade.

Standage, a company with only about 30 employees, is able to handle small-scale transactions that general trading companies cannot because it eliminates the complexities of trade through its own trade cloud platform.

Furthermore, since "DigiTrad" is eligible for the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's IT Introduction Subsidy, two-thirds of the introduction costs, up to a maximum of 3.5 million yen, can be covered by the subsidy, significantly reducing the cost burden on contracting companies.

There are only three application deadlines left for this year's IT implementation subsidy. Now is the perfect time to take the plunge into export markets, while the winds of change are strong.

 

*This press release contains excerpts from the seminar "The Era of 'Outsourcing' Trade: How to Start Overseas Expansion from Scratch" (held at Overseas Business EXPO Tokyo 2022, Lecturer: Kenta Omori, Executive Vice President of STANDAGE Co., Ltd.), which took place on November 17th (Thursday) from 15:00 to 16:00. For details and materials, please see below."DigiTrad" service official websitePlease contact us for further information.