Wataru Kuribayashi, known as Doug, is president & CEO of Presidio Ventures, the corporate venture capital (CVC) unit set up by Japanese conglomerate Sumitomo Corporation.
Kuribayashi has been with Sumitomo since 1995 in a variety of roles including CEO of the company’s ecommerce subsidiary Sumisho as well as a stint at SCSK, an IT services offshoot. He has been in charge of Presidio since 2020, with a primary focus on the IT and media sectors, although the Silicon Valley-based unit also collaborates with Sumitomo Corporation of Americas (SCOA) when investing in other industrial sectors.
Among Presidio’s recent deals are involvement in the $10m series B round for Karamba Security, a cybersecurity firm providing services for connected systems, a role in the $40m series B round for test automation provider Mabl and a part in the $140m series B round for Dexterity, a developer of robotics systems for the logistics industry.
Presidio currently has 36 active portfolio companies: these also include Humatics, a developer of positioning technology for robotic devices, 3D printing specialist Shapeways, and security labelling firm TruTag Technologies.
The unit has invested in more than 160 companies in the past two decades. Its key areas of interest are enterprise IT, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, digital media, mobility, internet of things, fintech and robotics.
Kuribayashi has a bachelor’s degree in law from Waseda University in Tokyo as well as an MBA from the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia.
