VUILD Raises Approximately 140 Million Yen, Bringing Cumulative Funding to Approximately 640 Million Yen

VUILD Inc. (hereafter VUILD) is pleased to announce that it has raised approximately 140 million yen through a third-party allotment of new shares to KOKUYO Co., Ltd., Shodoshima Healthy Land Co., Ltd., Speedy Inc., Nohara Holdings, Inc., hope for Co., Ltd. (in Japanese syllabary order), and individual investors. This brings the company’s cumulative funding to approximately 640 million yen.
Taking this funding as an opportunity, VUILD will accelerate collaboration with each investing company, centered on businesses such as the cloud timber pre-cutting service “EMARF” and the digital home-building platform “NESTING.”

• Business overview

Since its founding in autumn 2017, VUILD has been engaged in architectural design, including furniture making and housing that leverage digital fabrication technology; the import and sale of the American-made 3D wood-processing machine “ShopBot” (https://shopbot.vuild.co.jp/); and, to build a distributed manufacturing network, the provision of “EMARF” (https://emarf.co/), a distribution platform that connects via the cloud the ShopBots installed across Japan (130 locations as of the end of June 2022) so that parts for furniture and houses can be fabricated in a distributed way.
In April this year, VUILD entered the housing construction business by launching in full (opening orders for) the digital home-building platform “NESTING” (https://nesting.me/), which uses digital fabrication technology to deliver next-generation housing. We released three customizable templates and offer a quick and easy experience of creating, seamlessly from design to completion using digital technology, a comfortable home filled with what each person envisions. Since we began accepting orders we have received a great many inquiries, and we are now building the capacity to complete around ten houses within the next six months.
In the EMARF business, alongside growth in corporate demand, there has been a sharp increase in demand for reskilling designers through digital technology, and in July we launched “EMARF CONNECT” (https://connect.emarf.co/), a new monthly subscription service that offers a place to learn and practice. The service aims to help every designer repeatedly learn and practice, broaden the scope of their work and update their professional skills, and it shares know-how in computational design and digital fabrication that has rarely been made public. The first cohort, limited to 100 members, filled up right after the service was announced.

• Purpose of the funding / what comes next

The purpose of this funding is to further strengthen our relationships with each investing company, apply VUILD’s digital technology to their business areas, and advance our collaborations.
We will also build an organization to actively accelerate collaboration with other companies. By using digital technology to democratize the architecture industry, which has become highly specialized, we aim to realize a world where anyone can make the furniture, buildings and other things they need for daily life with their own hands.

[Comments from the investors (in Japanese syllabary order)]

• Hidekuni Kuroda, President and CEO, KOKUYO Co., Ltd.

For KOKUYO, which constantly seeks new value in how people’s places and spaces should be, starting from the office, VUILD’s “Marebito House,” winner of the Good Design Gold Award and an embodiment of VUILD’s mission of “democratizing architecture,” made a huge impact on our members. Since then, we have had many points of contact with VUILD and Mr. Akiyoshi, and through this capital and business alliance we have gained the opportunity to take on new solutions for KOKUYO’s office spaces and unprecedented business models for furniture. My heart is already dancing at what a tremendous opportunity for growth this will be for KOKUYO’s members. Beyond creating new products and services, we want to involve many companies and build momentum in society for a “movement to unleash people’s creativity.”

• 柳生敏宏, President and CEO, and 柳生忠勝, Executive Vice President, Shodoshima Healthy Land Co., Ltd.

“Democratizing architecture”: the vision championed by VUILD’s Mr. Akiyoshi sounded so interesting that we really wanted to do business together. Born on Shodoshima in the Seto Inland Sea, we grow olives and make skincare products that use the whole olive, and we are closely connected with the resources and challenges of our region. The trees planted across more than 100 hectares are hardly used in local construction. The use of locally quarried stone as a building material is also limited, because it makes little economic sense. But with Mr. Akiyoshi, we might be able to make it work. We will work together on architecture that turns challenges into hope and that even we, as farmers, can take part in.

• Atsushi Fukuda, President and CEO, Speedy Inc.

The most important thing in people’s lives is where they live. Yet although it is the most important, it is also the hardest to obtain. It is wrong that people should have to spend a lifetime of earnings to get that place.
Koki Akiyoshi, who leads VUILD, is trying to solve this lightly, using today’s technology. I am savoring the joy of taking part in a project that can contribute to the evolution of humankind.

• Kosuke Nohara, President and CEO, Nohara Holdings, Inc.

I met Mr. Akiyoshi three years ago and resonated with VUILD’s idea of “democratizing architecture,” which seeks to change the way things are made.
Since then, I have been impressed by the company’s foresight and by how it uses technology to bring that vision to life, from timber processing with data-linked ShopBot and EMARF to the digital home-building platform NESTING. At the end of last year, our company also began offering “BuildApp,” a service that uses digital power to streamline the construction supply chain.
As fellow companies aiming to transform the construction industry, we hope to collaborate in many different ways going forward.

• 三浦卓也, Director, hope for Co., Ltd.

We are a CVC (Corporate Venture Capital) wholly owned by FELISSIMO CORPORATION. As our company name suggests, under the concept of “increasing the number of companies that send hope to the future,” we form capital ties and collaborate with venture companies that create the future together with us through their business activities. Last year we had the opportunity to speak with Mr. Akiyoshi, Mr. Inoue and Mr. Yamakawa of VUILD. We resonated with the aspirations they described, “to make it normal for people to create their own way of living through technology” and “to bring forests and people closer together,” which led to this investment. We hope to envision together “a future where everyone enjoys creating their own way of living.”

• Comment from Koki Akiyoshi, CEO, VUILD Inc.

In our previous funding round in September 2021, we were joined by prominent entrepreneurs; in this round, we have been joined by operating companies that will run alongside us as business partners. Thanks to their support, EMARF, launched two years ago, has steadily built up a track record and has now grown to the brink of profitability.
Meanwhile, NESTING, launched this year, is still in its investment phase but is attracting many inquiries. Starting with the completion of the dozen or so houses now in progress, we will drive the business toward profitability next fiscal year.
For the time being, we will focus on two things, “becoming profitable” and “achieving our targets (100 houses built with NESTING and 10,000 EMARF users),” and then plan to apply leverage once again.

• Careers

The EMARF business is actively hiring design and fabrication support staff for corporate clients.
https://vuild.co.jp/company/#recruit
At VUILD, we share the basic principles of “autonomy, decentralization and cooperation,” and members carry out their work at their own discretion in their respective fields, whether fabricating on site or working remotely. Our members are based throughout Japan and some live overseas. Diverse ways of working are embraced, not only full-time employment but also freelance and side jobs, reflecting each person’s way of being.
If you are even a little interested in VUILD’s mission and work, please apply!

[VUILD Inc.]
Representative: Koki Akiyoshi (CEO)
Founded: November 21, 2017
Head office: unico 1F-A, 3-4 Nisshincho, Kawasaki-ku, Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Business: Architectural design; development and manufacture of wood products; sales of CNC routers; digital talent development; business development support; IT service development
URL: https://vuild.co.jp/
note: https://note.com/vuild
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vuild_official/
VUILD Twitter: https://twitter.com/VUILDinc
EMARF Twitter: https://twitter.com/EMARFco