Random Talks

Nobu Okada discovered his passion for all things space after attending NASA space camp in high school. Now, as founder of Singapore start-up ASTROSCAL

Jesper Koll calls himself a professional Japan optimist, but that doesn’t prevent him from speaking constructive truths to power. An advisor to a broa

Corporations and governments regularly ask Chandran Nair how to do business the right way in Asia. Chandran—who built Asia’s top environmental consult

Yoko Ishikura is reinvigorating education and Japan’s economy through various channels to foster creativity, innovation, and learning. With a fo

Raised in Africa and schooled in the UK and the U.S., Anthony Willoughby was 22 when he bought a one-way ticket on the Trans-Siberian Express to Japan

Masashi Kawamura has an idea lab. In that lab, called PARTY, he and several fellow creatives perform the advertising equivalent of alchemy, fusing raw

Few Westerners have delved deeper into the Japanese consumer’s psyche than Bill Hall. Bill began researching the Japanese market in the early 1970s be

Blind football is a universal sport that was originally conceived for the visually impaired, but can be taken part in by anyone through the use of an

Sometimes a single unlikely idea can have massive impact across the world. Sir Harold Evans, the author of They Made America, describes how frustratio

You can think of Toshi Nakamura’s NGO, Kopernik, as an online marketplace offering low tech with a higher purpose. Since 2009, Kopernik—a member of th

Beth Carroll, an Instructor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Purdue University, highlights the importance of shopping from small local business o

Life is serious enough, so James Curleigh wants us to go outside and play. In fact, he and his Oregon-based company KEEN Footwear encourage everybody

Bill Werlin was born in Colorado mountain territory and grew up working at his family’s ski area, surrounded by the majestic Rockies and untainted ski

Are we living in the era of the bold eccentric, the realm of the unfettered visionary? Masaki Takeuchi thinks so, and he should know: he’s the man in

Kumi Fujisawa is convinced that we can transform the world when we think, vocalize and act at the grassroots level. Getting people to realize the wort

An “explorer of all things Japan, from high finance to low-level politics”, Jesper Koll has over two decades of experience at major financ