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Its “ashes” story is one of the brightest booms in small-cap stocks, which is currently helping build wealth in Japan. T. Kobayashi, a company that helps startups and other companies create and develop new businesses and products, began offering its shares publicly in July and has more than tripled since then.
Few could have expected such a result two decades ago. According to T. Kobayashi himself, his parents kicked him out of the house at the age of 17 when a boy dropped out of a prestigious high school to focus all his attention on his musical group. During the day he played music and at night he used to sleep outside, covered in cardboard boxes from the cold. The one and a half year old boy lived like a homeless man.
After several fateful encounters, he found refuge and finally got a job as a software engineer. In addition, he became one of the main founders of the company, now called Sun * Inc. (pronounced Sun Asterisk) in 2012. In Vietnam. Today, Mr. Kobayashi is the CEO of Sun *.
“The winters have been cold,” recalls Kobayashi, 37, of his experience on the streets. – Sometimes I felt terrible. But those times are over. “
According to T. Kobayashi, her parents disagreed with her decision to drop out of high school. According to him, they prepared financial plans for the son to obtain a university education. Our attempts to contact Mr. Kobayashi’s parents were unsuccessful.
“They told me to leave, so I left, so much knowledge,” he says. “I wanted to live my life doing what was close to my heart.”
Kobayashi spent two winters on the streets of Tokyo’s Shinjuku and Shibuya districts.
Mostly outdoors
“It’s strange that he survived,” he recalls. – I spent the night where I spent time. About 80 percent. I spent the nights somewhere outside. “
Taihei Kobayashi
© Youtube
Yushi Fukagawa, a close friend of T. Kobayashi from school, who also currently works for Sun *, recalls the times when the current businessman was left homeless.
“I didn’t think too much,” Fukagawa said. “But my parents seemed alarmed.”
At age 19, T. Kobayashi took pity on the director of a live music club, offered him a job, and allowed him to spend the night on the club’s premises. He did it for about six years.
In the end, Mr. Kobayashi decided it was time to move on. He initially made money selling music records online. Then he found a job that did not require any qualifications or experience. All it took was a test.
The six-hour test assessed their math skills, logical thinking, and IQ. Mr. Koyabashi hired him and started working for a company where he learned programming skills.
Start of the company
This is how he met Makoto Hirai, one of the founders of Sun *. They both agreed that there are many software engineers who are excellent at programming, but few could apply those skills to create business models that work. So they decided to create a company to fill that gap.
T. Kobayashi 2012 moved to Vietnam, where he began hiring the country’s young engineers. 2013 In March 2019, the founders founded Framgia Inc. in Japan. changed his name to Sun *. The idea was to provide software support to Japanese startups trying to build promising businesses.
“Our position was to commit to growing these startups, even if that would mean a loss to us,” Kobayashi said.
Over the years, Sun * has expanded its business and now has more than 70 clients. The company was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in July. Its shares rose nearly six times in September, with a market value of more than $ 1.4 billion. dollars Since then, they have fallen 38% and the market capitalization has fallen below one billion dollars. 7.9 percent Kobayashi’s stake is worth about $ 71 million.
Sun’s net income * for the nine months ended September was $ 649 million. yen ($ 6.2 million) of $ 3.97 billion. income in yen.
Ruthless competition
Mitsushige Akino, CEO of Ichiyoshi Asset Management Co., said demand for the company’s services was high, but sales and profits were still low and competition fierce.
“Sometimes it’s not easy,” admits Akino. – We will see if the company can maintain the growth rate. This is especially true for incomes, which are currently low. “
2019 Upon returning from Vietnam to Japan, Kobayashi says the company also receives orders from larger firms, including the Nikkei 225 Stock Average. Sun customers * include Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank Corp., according to the company’s website.
“We want to be aggressive and offer our services to large corporations,” he says. “That’s why we decided to visit.”
Sun * aims to increase its revenue by at least 20-30%. every year. The number of employees at the Tokyo office has doubled to 130 this year, says Kobayashi. The company continues to be headquartered in Vietnam and employs about 1,300 people.
Sun * is one of many companies on the TSE Mothers Index whose shares rose this year as investors actively invested in technology companies during the pandemic. The boot indicator reached its highest point in 14 years in October. Despite more than tripling, Sun * was not even in the top ten in the index this year. The company’s stock is trading at approximately 195 times greater earnings and approximately 19 times greater book value.
“You can call them impulse stocks,” said Tomoichiro Kubota, a senior market analyst at Matsui Securities Co. in Tokyo, noting their “extremely high price-to-earnings ratio.” “This will be affected by how long this start-up trend remains positive.”
Kobayashi says he understands the risk but doesn’t intimidate him. The entrepreneur admits that he has faced much tougher challenges in the past. Now he communicated with his parents again, and the times when he had to spend the night on the street were only a distant memory.
“What I want to do now is try to implement the vision of our company,” he says.
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