Rakuten, the e-commerce leader in japan, chooses barcelona to enter the spanish market

Rakuten, the leader japanese e-commerce company, will enter the spanish market with the opening of an office in barcelona.

the company has the ambitious objective of becoming the leader in the spanish market in five years. the company’s decision to choose barcelona (up to now it had a commercial presence in madrid) is the result of the collaboration with the tokyo team of invest in catalonia, which has worked in the project since its origin. invest in catalonia additionally has helped to speed up the visa and work permits for the japanese executives involved, and has collaborated with the public employment service to select the adequate profiles for the new jobs.

rakuten has developed an online platform for sme’s of different industries, from electronic gadgets to home products, cinema or videogames. this platform is also used by these companies to sell their products and get at the same time logistics, marketing and promotion services among others. the catalan subsidiary of rakuten is only the second one opened in europe, after the first one in france, and will create 25 jobs in the initial period which will grow to 80 in the coming 3 years.

founded in tokyo in 1997, rakuten is considered one of the 10 most innovative companies in the world by forbes magazine. in europe it has offices in france, austria, germany, and the uk.

source: invest in catalonia