new delhi a new wave of small japanese investors is scouting in india for earlystage startups they can bet their money on undeterred by a bearish spell that threatens to upset tokyobased softbanks biggest wagers in the country reapra ventures and asuka corporation are the latest japanese earlystage investors preparing for their india debut joining incubate fund gree ventures mistletoe capital and other funds that have recently started investing in the country this fresh infusion of capital likely signals a return of confidence in indias startup ecosystem despite a recent battering of some wellknown consumer internet companies although not without a healthy dose of caution unlike softbank that invested hundreds of millions of dollars in potential blockbusters such as the now struggling snapdeal the new investors from japan are cherrypicking small startups with niche technology that can be exported to other asian markets some of these investors et spoke with said they were more likely to spare much smaller sums of 15 million for companies they decide to back we are not eyeing models like uber which are easy to have ideas on disrupt and scale we are looking for startups that can create business models in complex markets said japanese entrepreneur shuhei morofuji the 39yearold founder of reapra ventures who wants to take indian companies to southeast asian markets an example would be startups experimenting with experiential travel or trekking within the larger travel market morofuji who hosted a dinner for 30 startup founders and investors in new delhi last month said india will be a major market for 30 investments planned this year from reapra which will invest about 1million per deal reapra has invested nearly 30 million in 60 startups across indonesia the philippines bangladesh singapore thailand korea and malaysia several of the japanese funds that have entered india in the last two years are expanding their fund allocations for the country and accelerating their pace of dealmaking incubate fund which has invested in three startups including indorebased shopkirana since it entered india in 2016 expects to back another dozen companies this year and expand its india fund size to 1520 million from 5 million et reported recently gree ventures has overshot its target corpus of 60 million for its south east asia fund from which it invests in indian startups the fund has made six investments so far including in mumbaibased fashion rental startup flyrobe a couple of more deals are in the pipeline for the india market it will be a 5050 split between southeast asia and india from our current fund we are quite bullish on india said investment manager nikhil kapur we dont want to get swayed by market buzz words we dont mind working against the market it is challenging but you get the best outcomes also it is clear in india that customer loyalty is fickle and price sensitivity is the major barrier the fresh capital flow from these funds into india comes at a time when the overall value and