Solo-Founder 101: How Anyone Can Start a Business Using AI

Thu Apr 09 2026 at 07:00 pm to 08:00 pm UTC+09:00

Venture Café Tokyo | Tokyo

Founder Institute Japan
Publisher/HostFounder Institute Japan
Solo-Founder 101: How Anyone Can Start a Business Using AI
Advertisement
There’s a common belief that starting a business requires a technical co-founder, a full team, or years of industry experience before you can make your first move. But today, that is no longer a requirement.
A new generation of founders and solo-entrepreneurs is building and launching companies on their own, leveraging AI as their advantage. They are running customer interviews, stress-testing ideas, conducting market research, and building pitch decks in a fraction of the time it used to take entire teams.
Our Speaker and Managing Director, Erdinc Ekinci, who has worked with hundreds of founders across Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, has seen firsthand how AI is collapsing the gap between idea and execution. In this session, he will share the exact prompts, tools, and workflows that solo-founders are using right now to move faster with less, covering everything from customer development and competitive research to product scoping and investor pitching.
If you have an idea but don't know where to start, or you're already building and want to work smarter, this session will give you a concrete and practical playbook to take action.
Venue
Venture Cafe Tokyo.
Agenda
- Welcome and Introduction
- Discussion on key topics
- Q&A Session
​- Networking Session
Featured Speaker
​- Erdinc Ekinci - Founder, Investment Lead of Co-capital.vc, Co-Founder, CEO of Openfor.co, Managing Director of Founder Institute Japan/Korea/Taiwan
- We're also expecting 2 more guest founders to join the stage for a short inside talk, each sharing 5 minutes of real lessons from their own founder journey. More names to be announced soon.
What You'll Learn:
-How to use AI to stress-test your startup idea and run faster customer development.
-Specific prompts and tool combinations for market research, competitive analysis, and prototyping.
-How to craft and practice your pitch using AI, including building a full pitch deck with Claude Skills.
Who Should Attend:
-Aspiring founders who want to start a business but lack technical skills
-Entrepreneurs exploring how AI can accelerate their startup journey
-Professionals considering launching a side project or solo startup
-Early-stage founders interested in AI-powered workflows

About Ecosystem Organization:
​- Founder Institute: Founder Institute is an equity warrant-based non-funding accelerator that supports determined founders who already have some scalable ideas and are committed to entrepreneurship. At this stage, founders validate their ideas, build a strong founder mindset, and learn through structured programs, mentorship, and accountability. Founder Institute helps turn raw ideas into real startup foundations.
​- Founder Capital: Founder Capital is a venture capital firm focused on investing in FI’s best-performing pre-seed full-time founders who have already demonstrated traction. This layer supports founders who are building full-time, executing consistently, and showing early signs of market validation. It provides capital, strategic guidance, and long-term partnership to help founders scale with confidence.
​- Openfor.co: It is an entrepreneurial talent development company and non-equity venture/ecosystem builder supporting individuals and organizations starting from individual-level; detects high-potential people with our proprietary system, developing and featuring personal stories to launching a digitally productized personal brands, content creation and visibility with our 700K audience reach, to turning it into a business, and monetization to all the way up to launching a company. All-in-one platform with a marketplace, education, back-office support, content creation, and global reach, combining early visibility with hands-on operational support. Meanwhile, as an ecosystem builder, we work with more later-stage startups, larger enterprises, and governments, building and operating complex multinational 7-8 figure programs. It all boils down to this: we are on a mission to make the venture ecosystem accessible, making the world a more entrepreneurial place.
- Venture Cafe Tokyo: A global community where various innovators, including entrepreneurs, investors, researchers, and students, gather, connect, and create innovation in society through a variety of programs.
​-Co-Capital: Co-capital is a strategic VC-as-a-Service firm pre-seed to Series A stage, focused on seeking strong partner alignment. Specializing in GTM expansion, venture building, and marketing-led growth, working with elite entrepreneurial talent and scalable startups preparing for global GTM and investment readiness. Powered by a 300+ individual expert network and delivered in close collaboration with Founder Institute and Openfor.co, enabling fast momentum and execution.
Advertisement

Event Venue

Venture Café Tokyo, Toranomon Hills Business Tower 15F, 1-17-1 Toranomon,Minato,Tokyo,Japan

Tickets

Icon
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.

Ask AI if this event suits you:

More Events in Tokyo

Kawol SamarQandi \u6975\u79c1\u7684\u97f3\u697d\u8b1b Extra Performance Edition Full Acoustic Solo Improv @ \u6708\u82b1\u820e
Wed, 08 Apr at 07:30 pm Kawol SamarQandi 極私的音楽講 Extra Performance Edition Full Acoustic Solo Improv @ 月花舎

月花舎・茶会記クリフサイド

Chama do Zouk\ud83d\udd25
Wed, 08 Apr at 07:30 pm Chama do Zouk🔥

中野ダンススクール

World Conference on Quantum Computing and Applications
Thu, 09 Apr at 09:30 am World Conference on Quantum Computing and Applications

Tokyo Prince Hotel, Tokyo, Japan

World Conference on Quantum Computing and Applications
Thu, 09 Apr at 09:30 am World Conference on Quantum Computing and Applications

Tokyo, Japan

Lisa Ono, Luis Valle in \u5343\u4ee3\u7530\u533a
Thu, 09 Apr at 06:30 pm Lisa Ono, Luis Valle in 千代田区

東京国際フォーラム ホールC

\u6d6e\u4e16\u7d75night\u300c\u6d77\u3092\u6e21\u308b\u6d6e\u4e16\u7d75\u305f\u3061\uff5e\u6c17\u306b\u306a\u308b!\u30b8\u30e3\u30dd\u30cb\u30b9\u30e0\uff5e\u300d
Thu, 09 Apr at 06:35 pm 浮世絵night「海を渡る浮世絵たち~気になる!ジャポニスム~」

GINZA SIX (Chuo-ku, Tokyo, Japan)

Ecuagenera\u306f\u300cOkibota Spring 2026\u300d\u306b\u53c2\u52a0\u3057\u307e\u3059\u3002
Fri, 10 Apr at 10:00 am Ecuageneraは「Okibota Spring 2026」に参加します。

つきじ植むらサンシャインシティアルパ店

\u9295\u4ed9\u4f1a\u5b9a\u671f\u516c\u6f14\u30084\u6708\u3009
Fri, 10 Apr at 06:00 pm 銕仙会定期公演〈4月〉

観世能楽堂 GINA SIX

\u99ff\u6cb3\u53f0\u4e0b\u30d5\u30ea\u30fc\u30bb\u30c3\u30b7\u30e7\u30f3\uff0849\uff09
Fri, 10 Apr at 06:30 pm 駿河台下フリーセッション(49)

駿河台下スタジオ

\u30ad\u30be\u30d0\u30c1\u30e3\u30d5\u30e9\u30a4\u30c7\u30fc
Fri, 10 Apr at 07:00 pm キゾバチャフライデー

スタジオJBA

\u00a5ellow Bucks in \u6c5f\u6771\u533a
Fri, 10 Apr at 07:00 pm ¥ellow Bucks in 江東区

Tokyo is Happening!

Never miss your favorite happenings again!

Explore Tokyo Events