Startup grants and programs in Japan (2026)
We track 9 programs open to startups in Japan beyond the worldwide ones: 5 national or local and 4 regional programs that include Japan. 4 are open now and 5 are paused until their next round. By type: Government Grants (4), GPU & Compute (2), Accelerators & Incubators (1), AI Models & APIs (1), Research & Students (1).
4 of the national programs are government grants, vouchers or tax credits; 4 of them come from NEDO (Japan). 2 accept students or researchers. On top of these, 234 worldwide programs (mostly cloud, AI and software credits) are open to Japan-based startups; the eligibility checker filters all of them for your company.
National and local programs in Japan (5)
| Program | What you get | Type | Status | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NEDO Deep-Tech Startup Support Program (DTSU)NEDO (Japan) | Subsidy covering up to 2/3 of costs: STS phase up to JPY 300M/500M, PCA up to JPY 500M/1B, DMP (mass-production demo) up to JPY 2.5B; max… | Innovation grant (VC co-funded) | Paused: next round TBA | 2026-10-23 |
| NEDO New Energy SME & Startup Support (新エネ中小・スタートアップ支援制度)NEDO (Japan) | Phase A FS up to ¥10M (8/10), Phase B up to ¥50M (8/10), Phase C up to ¥150M (~$1M, 2/3); VC-linked α/β tracks up to ¥70M | Cleantech R&D subsidy | Paused: next round TBA | 2026-10 |
| NEDO NEP Yakushin (Accelerator) CourseNEDO (Japan) | Grant up to ¥5M or ¥30M (~$200k) at 100% (carve-out tracks 75%), plus mentor matching | Deep-tech founder grant | Paused: next round TBA | 2026-10 |
| Google for Startups Accelerator: JapanGoogle | Equity-free mentoring, Google product credits and Cloud credits (amounts not stated), plus Cloud TPU access | Corporate accelerator | Paused: next round TBA | 2026-10-23 |
| NEDO NEP Kaitaku (Frontier) CourseNEDO (Japan) | Flexible activity funding (amount not stated on page) + mentoring by experienced 'Accompany-Runners' | Pre-founding programme | Paused: next round TBA | 2026-10 |
Regional programs that include Japan (4)
| Program | What you get | Where | Status | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lambda Cloud compute offer for Y Combinator companiesLambda | $20,000 in Lambda Cloud credits for on-demand GPU instances | 18 countries | Open | 2026-10-22 |
| fal Startup Programfal | $1,000 starter pack, growing to $2,500 and $5,000 as monthly fal spend rises | Europe, Asia | Open | 2026-10-22 |
| Lambda Cloud credits for NVIDIA Inception membersLambda | $1,000 in Lambda Cloud credits for on-demand GPU instances (B200, H100, A100, GH200) | 18 countries | Open | 2026-10-22 |
| Google Cloud Research CreditsGoogle | Google Cloud credits sized to your proposal (amount not stated on page), valid 1 year | 75 countries | Open | 2026-10-22 |
Other countries
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Program terms change often. Open a program to see its official source and verification date, and confirm on the provider's page before you apply. Spotted something out of date? Report a correction.