Tokium

TOKIUM Inc., originally founded as BearTail Co., Ltd. in June 2012, operates as a pivotal player in Japan's FinTech and SaaS markets, focusing on expenditure management for corporate clients. The company was established by Kenichi Kurosaki and Motoshi Nishihira, who were students at the University of Tsukuba at the time. Kurosaki's entrepreneurial drive was sparked by his experience during the Great East Japan Earthquake volunteer efforts and a realization at a startup conference that he could create impactful solutions. This led to the initial development of a B2C personal finance application, "Dr.Wallet," launched in August 2013, which utilized human operators to digitize receipt data.

Observing the needs of the corporate sector, the company pivoted to a B2B model, launching an expense management system, now known as "TOKIUM Expense," in February 2016. This strategic shift marked a significant milestone, leading to the development of a comprehensive suite of cloud-based services. The company's platform is designed to automate and streamline accounting and administrative tasks, catering primarily to small and medium-sized enterprises. Revenue is generated through a subscription-based, tiered pricing model for its cloud services, which includes business and enterprise plans with fees often based on usage.

TOKIUM's core offering is a multi-faceted platform described as an "Accounting AI Agent." This platform integrates AI, cloud systems, and professional staff to handle tedious back-office tasks. Key services include "TOKIUM Invoice" for receiving and digitizing invoices, "TOKIUM Expense" for simplifying expense claims via receipt photos, "TOKIUM Electronic Bookkeeping" for compliant document storage, and "TOKIUM Contract Management" for centralizing and managing contracts. A distinctive feature of their service is the combination of AI-OCR with human operators to ensure high data accuracy, claiming over 99% precision, and offering physical document handling and storage to achieve a paperless environment for their clients. The company has successfully raised significant capital, with total funding reaching $54.4M, to fuel its growth and product development.

Keywords: expenditure management, expense reporting automation, invoice processing, B2B SaaS, FinTech Japan, accounting automation, cloud-based accounting, receipt scanning, paperless office solutions, corporate expense management, document management system, Kenichi Kurosaki, contract lifecycle management, business process outsourcing, AI in accounting, Japanese startups, accounts payable automation, T&E management, compliance management, back-office automation