"There is no company that has this portfolio."Michael Spranger isn't exaggerating. As COO at Sony Research and president of Sony AI, he's watched Sony transform from a TV company into a $166B entertainment empire.In this episode with Tiffany Kayo, Michael breaks down Sony's AI strategy: what they choose to build (and what they ignore).Key insights:- Sony's shift from electronics to entertainment- Why PlayStation is now their biggest business- GT Sophy: the racing AI agent - Sony sensors are inside half the world's smartphones- Japan's 10-year manufacturing window- Why kando drives everything Sony buildsConnect with us here: - Michael Spranger: linkedin.com/in/michael-spranger-4aa36716 - Tiffany Kayo: linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo

“We thought it would be too hard to build.”

That’s how Mikey Shulman, Co-Founder of Suno, describes the early days of building what is now a $200M revenue company with 100M users. Suno has since partnered with Warner Music Group and is redefining how music gets made.

In this episode, Mikey envisions a future where passive listeners become active collaborators, and where your favorite artist might perform a fan-made version of their own song live on stage.

He shares:

- Why they almost built a completely different company

- The future of "interactive music" (music you play with, not just play)

- How Warner Music Group became Suno's partner

- Japan's unique embrace of Suno

Connect with Mikey:

X: https://x.com/MikeyShulman

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeyshulman/

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: https://coralcap.co/contact/?lang=en

Devon Zuegel, founder and CEO of the Esmeralda Institute, joins us on the latest episode of The Coral Capital Podcast.

After building online communities, scaling open-source programs at GitHub, and hosting Notion’s Pioneers series, Devon Zuegel is now bringing her expertise offline to create a family focused village north of San Francisco.

In this episode, she shares the challenges of shaping a people centered village, from navigating complex land use regulations to balancing environmental realities.

Topics explored:

- How San Francisco’s housing shortages inspired Devon to create Esmeralda

- Why California’s CEQA further fueled Devon’s passion for urban planning

- Designing multi-generational, walkable communities with a balance of density and nature

- The concept of “traveling neighborhoods” and fostering connection through shared experiences

- The hardware and software of building a physical community

- Integrating seniors, families, and diverse age groups into a cohesive community

- Creating lasting culture and connection through deliberate programming and shared experiences

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: bit.ly/contactcoral

Connect with Devon:

X: https://x.com/devonzuegel

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/devonzuegel/

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

Connect with Alexandra Silverman:

X: https://x.com/AlexandraFayeS

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afsilverman/

00:00 Intro

00:46 Meet Devin

08:19 Placemaking and Traveling Neighborhoods

16:51 Building Esmeralda

31:12 Supporting Families in Northern California

33:23 Incorporating the Elderly in Community Planning

38:17 Learning from Other Towns and Cities

47:09 Building a New Town

Koichi Narasaki, former Chief Digital Officer of SOMPO and the architect behind Palantir Japan, joins us on the latest episode of The Coral Capital Podcast.

From his early days at Mitsubishi Corporation investing in Silicon Valley startups during the dotcom boom, to leading one of Japan’s most successful joint ventures with Palantir, Narasaki has been at the intersection of global tech and Japanese enterprise for decades.

He shares stories from passing on PayPal in 1998, to convincing SOMPO’s leadership to invest $500M into Palantir, and lessons on how foreign companies can succeed in Japan.

Topics explored:

• Why Mitsubishi’s early CVC efforts in Silicon Valley clashed with Tokyo HQ

• Meeting Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, and Marc Benioff in the 1990s

• The cultural gap between fast-moving Silicon Valley and conservative Japan

• Why he left Mitsubishi after nearly 20 years to join startups on the other side of the table

• How he became SOMPO’s first Chief Digital Officer and redefined “DX” in insurance

• The story of Palantir’s failed solo Japan entry, and how the SOMPO JV turned it around

• What convinced SOMPO’s CEO to greenlight a 50/50 joint venture with Palantir

• How “dogfooding” Foundry inside SOMPO unlocked trust with Japanese clients

• The legendary $500M Palantir investment during the pandemic, and the debates behind it

• What global B2B software founders need to know before entering Japan

• His perspective on culture, trust, and speed inside a 135-year-old Japanese giant

Connect with Narasaki:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/koichi-narasaki-5969b/

Connect with James:

X: https://x.com/james_riney

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesriney

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: https://bit.ly/contactcoral

(00:00) Trailer(01:00) Intro(05:16) Leaving Mitsubishi & the dot-com crash
(14:34) Early startup journey (Allyno → Access)
(17:02) Becoming Chief Digital Officer at SOMPO
(20:20) Discovering Palantir & messy data realities
(26:18) The meeting with Alex Karp that changed everything
(35:00) Why the SOMPO–Palantir JV happened
(43:56) Growing in Japan: revenue, culture, challenges
(55:42) Advice for foreign SaaS entering Japan

Ayao Komatsu, the team principal of Haas F1, joins us on the latest episode of The Coral Capital Podcast.

As the first Japanese team principal (leading a non-Japanese F1 team), Komatsu offers a unique perspective on leadership in Formula 1.

Ayao shares insights on Haas F1's new technical partnership with Toyota and the challenges of competing with limited resources as the team looks ahead to the 2026 rule changes.

Topics explored:

• How Ayao navigated an unconventional route into Formula One

• Lessons from growing up in a politically and culturally unique household

• What it’s like managing a lean, global team across continents

• The mindset shifts required to lead in high-performance environments

• How Haas F1 is approaching its partnership with Toyota

• Insights into the upcoming 2026 regulation overhaul—and why it matters

• Why communication and culture are now top priorities at Haas

• What Japanese teams can learn from international motorsport organizations

• Ayao’s take on long-term strategy vs. short-term pressure in F1

• How he defines success beyond the podium

Connect with Ayao:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ayao-komatsu-828a8587/

X: https://x.com/AyaoKomatsu

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: https://bit.ly/contactcoral

00:00 Trailer

00:54 Introduction

01:17 Fascinating upbringing

05:58 Unique parenting style

11:09 “…Until I met F1”

13:59 Being Japanese in the industry

20:25 Different environments

25:51 The technical partnership

32:07 Life as an engineer

39:33 Improving team capability

43:26 Starting from scratch

47:53 Engineering at the heart of management

51:39 Alignment gaps

58:23 What’s new in Formula One

1:01:09 The ideal goal

1:03:53 Reasonably determined

1:08:12 Outro

At Coral Capital’s Tokyo HQ, artist–entrepreneur VERBAL (m-flo rapper and producer, AMBUSH® Co-Founder, and SŌMATŌ sake founder) sits down with James Riney and Tiffany Kayo to unpack how Japan’s next cultural wave is being built at the intersection of streetwear, music, and frontier tech.

They explore why a Tokyo mindset still captivates tastemakers from Pharrell to Prada, and what has to change for Japan’s creators to capture Silicon-Valley-level scale.

The conversation dives into:

• Streetwear’s original “soft-power” playbook — how Nigo, Pharrell, and a Harajuku network turned Japanese design into hip-hop currency and seeded brands like AMBUSH®.

• Two SKUs and a Paris runway — why VERBAL and Yoon Ahn sold a majority stake in AMBUSH®, what they learned inside New Guards Group / Farfetch, and why they just bought it all back.

• Craft sake, misunderstood luxury — the cold-chain, labeling, and pricing gaps keeping nihon-shu under-valued abroad, and how SŌMATŌ plans to rebrand the category for Michelin tables.

• AI, Web3, and VTubers — a realist’s take on Suno-generated melodies, token-gated superfans, and the virtual-idol economy Japan is quietly leading.

• Lessons from K-Pop’s public-private machine — what Japan can borrow (and what it shouldn’t) to export its own IP at scale.

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: bit.ly/contactcoral

Connect with VERBAL:

X: https://x.com/VERBAL_AMBUSH

Connect with James:

X: https://x.com/james_riney

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesriney

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

In this episode of The Coral Capital Podcast former Financial Times editor and author of Gambling Man, joins Tiffany Kayo and James Riney for a conversation about one of Japan’s most enigmatic figures: Masayoshi Son.

Barber shares what it was like sitting across from Masa, why his story is more than a business saga, and how SoftBank’s founder became a symbol of Japan’s global ambitions and contradictions.

We get into:

• The early years: Pachinko, pseudonyms, and SoftBank before Silicon Valley

• Behind-the-scenes stories of his deal with Donald Trump

• The $500B Stargate Project with Sam Altman and Larry Ellison of OpenAI

• Personal stories from Lionel’s interviews with Masa, his family, and the unlikely figures who shaped his journey—including Steve Jobs

Lionel’s book: https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/Gambling-Man-Wild-Japan’s-Masayoshi/dp/0241582725 

The Japanese edition of the book will be launched soon.

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here: bit.ly/contactcoral

Connect with Lionel:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lionel-barber-473826135/

X: https://x.com/lionelbarber

Connect with James:

X: https://x.com/james_riney

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesriney

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

On this episode of The Coral Capital Podcast, we were joined by the Chief Evangelist of Canva for a candid conversation about grit, growth, and the unfiltered story behind his remarkable career.

Also in the conversation:

• The Silicon Valley myth that keeps getting mistaken for strategy

• What Apple got right (and still gets wrong) about AI

• How Canva is spreading design literacy globally

• Why your ikigai doesn’t need to be world-changing to be real

Plus: Guy opens up about fainting on hospital rounds, quitting law school after two weeks, and how a ride in a Porsche 911 lit a fire under him to work hard and aim higher.

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Connect with Guy:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/guykawasaki/

X: https://x.com/GuyKawasaki

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

Get in touch with us here: bit.ly/contactcoral

00:00 Trailer

00:58 Introduction

01:41 Hawaii

02:40 Childhood and upbringing

06:49 Ohana, aloha and motivation

10:41 Working at Apple

15:01 Bringing the good news

19:28 The ecosystem VC

21:26 Evangelism in marketing

27:13 Growth, grit, grace

36:38 Artificial intelligence

42:19 Cutting through the noise

44:09 Book updates

46:23 What is your ikigai?

47:42 Outro

Mentioned in this episode: Kalihi Elementary School, Apple, Standford Medical Center, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), World War 2, Porsche 1911, OpenAI ChatGPT, Canva, Adobe Photoshop, Guy Kawasaki’s Remarkable People, Jane Goodall, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Wolfram, Mark Manson, Signal, Anthropic Claude, Perplexity, Apple Intelligence, TikTok

On this episode of The Coral Capital Podcast, Founding Partner James Riney and Investor Tiffany Kayo were joined by Phil Wickham, co-founder of Sozo Ventures—a globally-minded VC firm that’s backed breakout U.S. companies expanding into Japan, including the likes of Coinbase, Square & Palantir.

Philip shares rare, behind-the-scenes insights from decades spent bridging Silicon Valley and Tokyo, explaining why Japan is suddenly hot again for global startups—and how to navigate its famously complex corporate and cultural terrain.

Topics explored:

• The four pillars that make Japan a high-margin & high-loyalty market worth cracking
• Lessons from backing companies like Palantir, Square, Coinbase, and Need in Japan
• Why corporate money on your cap table can be more risk than reward—especially in Japan
• What founders consistently get wrong when entering Japan, and how to avoid wasting years

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here

Phil's Book: https://www.amazon.co.jp/2032年、日本がスタートアップのハブになる：世界を動かす才能を解放せよ-フィル・ウィックハム/dp/4910487042?tag=googhydr-22&source=dsa&hvcampaign=books&gad_source=1

00:00 Trailer

00:48 Introduction

03:06 Selling Japan to Startups

06:21 The Challenges of Entering Japan

09:01 First Steps for Expanding into Japan

13:02 Case Studies: Coinbase & NEED

16:06 Palantir’s Unique Approach to Japan

20:03 The Role of Corporates in Startup Growth

23:42 Targeting the Right Partners in Japan

28:06 Joint Ventures vs Independent Expansion

39:12 Keeping Options Open in Japan

51:05 Japan’s Global Competitive Edge

Connect with Phil: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pwickham/

Connect with James:

X: https://x.com/james_riney

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesriney

Connect with Tiffany:

X: https://x.com/tiffanykayo

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffanykayo/

Learn more about Coral Capital

This episode was produced & distributed with the help of our friends at Atomik Growth.

At Coral Capital’s Tokyo HQ, economist and writer Noah Smith joins James Riney, Founding Partner and CEO of Coral Capital, to explore how Japan is uniquely positioned for a global resurgence.

They discuss how the country can convert its global fascination into a strategic advantage, and why Japan is increasingly on the radar of institutional capital and high-net-worth investors.

The conversation dives into:

• The rise of the “weeb” economy” (think anime, fashion, subculture, and Japan’s growing soft power on the global stage)

• Why Japan is primed for greenfield FDI in AI, semiconductors, and deep tech

• How Tokyo is rivaling Austin and Paris as a global tech & startup hub

• Japan’s untapped operational MOAT for builders and investors

If you're working on something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you at Coral Capital!

Get in touch with us here

Chapters:

00:00 Trailer

00:52 "Weebs" and Japanese tourism

05:48 Rule by law and economic factors

14:22 GDP and exports

17:19 Cultural mindshare and diasporas

24:51 Enterprise value creation

30:29 Small businesses

34:46 Financial policy

39:35 Immigration, fluency, zero-tolerance

47:54 Exports need improvement

49:35 Untapped demand

50:00 Plaza Accord

54:50 Book plug and outro

Mentioned in this episode: Battle Royale, Ruth Benedict, Sakana AI, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC), Apple iPhone, Taro Kono, Mijoté San Francisco, The Boeing Company, Christopher Poole a.k.a. moot, Jack Ma, Silicon Valley, Dell Inc., Donald Trump, WeChat (Weixin)

Connect with Noah: https://x.com/Noahpinion

Noah’s Substack: https://www.noahpinion.blog/

Connect with James:

• X: https://x.com/james_riney

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesriney

Learn more about Coral Capital

This episode was produced & distributed with the help of our friends at Atomik Growth.