Associate director, Nomura-SRI innovation center
Aya Iwasuji serves as the associate director of the Nomura-SRI Innovation Center (NSIC) and is responsible for its member company engagement, program development, ecosystem and partnership development, and overall operations. With a deep understanding of Japanese business practice and culture as well as the Silicon Valley ecosystem, Iwasuji has a 10+ year history of creating successful partnerships and collaborations amongst large corporations, startups, research institutions, and academia and bridging Japan and Silicon Valley.
As a cross-border business consultant/educator, Iwasuji has worked with 200+ large Japanese corporations and 50+ startups and built and executed high-impact consulting projects, including executive and leadership programs on innovation, business acceleration, entrepreneurship, and new business creation.
Prior to SRI, Iwasuji was the program manager of industrial technologies and innovation at the New Energy and Industrial Technologies Development Organization (NEDO) Silicon Valley Office, where she created and managed programs that supported large Japanese corporations’ innovation efforts and startups looking to expand their business in the Bay Area. She received her M.A. in linguistics from San Francisco State University and her B.A. in international studies from Meiji Gakuin University.