Bit Valley

Bit Valley is an area of Shibuya, a suburb of Tokyo, that housed many of Japan’s Internet startups during the dot-com boom. The name Bit Valley is a play on the English translation of Shibuya (bitter valley) and the computer term, "bit." Bit Valley was seen as the Japanese answer to Silicon Valley, but it did not achieve the size and scale of its U.S. cousin before the dot-com bubble burst.

Bit Valley received a high level of investment from Japanese firms, which in itself was groundbreaking. Prior to the 1990s, Japanese firms were very hesitant about investing in startups. Unfortunately, the dot-com bust sunk many of the tech firms in Bit Valley. Although there is still a tech presence in Bit Valley, Japan’s post-bubble tech and Internet firms are not concentrated in a single location.

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