What NKC Asia does

NKC Asia (株式会社NKC ASIA) is a privately held Japanese holding company founded in March 2015 and headquartered in Shibuya-ku, Tokyo. It operates primarily through its wholly-owned subsidiary 株式会社テックビズ (Techbiz), which runs the Techbiz Freelance platform — an IT freelancer job-matching marketplace described by the company as Japan's largest, matching IT freelancers with project opportunities on a transaction-fee basis. Beyond matching, the group bundles adjacent services for freelancers: tax filing support via Techbiz-affiliated tax accountants, a Techbiz Gold Card business credit card, the Techbiz Life Support welfare and points program, and a Techbiz Media information portal. The group also operates a venture investment and support arm that has taken minority stakes in IT startups (freecracy, Alpaca.Lab, ELSOUL LABO) and Meet.jobs (Taiwan).

The underlying technology is a two-sided marketplace platform with a freelancer-facing self-serve portal and a separate corporate client portal (freelance.techbiz.co.jp/client/) for hiring managers. Since August 2021, the matching engine has incorporated NLP-based scoring of client project requests and economics-driven pricing optimization, developed in collaboration with Tokyo University Economic Consulting (UTEcon). The company holds worker dispatch (派 13-315972, 派 13-310777) and fee-based placement licenses (13-ユ-314106, 13-ユ-309563), enabling both pure matching and direct dispatch engagements.

NKC Asia generates revenue through three principal streams: IT freelance job-matching transaction fees, worker dispatch services (2021 dispatch period showed an average fee of ¥32,250/day against an average wage of ¥22,269/day, implying a gross margin of ~30.95%), and venture investment/professional services. It serves individual IT freelancers as the primary demand-side persona and corporate IT hiring managers as the primary supply-side buyer, supported by 9 sales offices across Japan (Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Fukuoka, Hiroshima, Sendai, Kanazawa, Okayama, Sapporo). The group employs approximately 310 people and has been recognized on the Financial Times/Statista High-Growth Companies Asia-Pacific list in both 2022 (rank 51 APAC / 10 Japan) and 2023 (rank 119 APAC / 19 Japan), with absolute revenue growth of 500.5% cited for the 2018–2021 period.

Name

NKC Asia

Legal name

株式会社NKC ASIA

Website

https://nkc-asia.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2015

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1,001–5,000 employees

Short description

NKC Asia, via its Techbiz subsidiary, operates Japan's largest IT freelancer job-matching marketplace, connecting 2,000+ monthly IT contractors with corporate clients across 9 nationwide offices and bundling tax, credit card, and welfare services around the core matching transaction.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Tokyo

HQ country

Japan

HQ region

Asia

Offices9 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. IT Freelance Job Matching Services: Matching IT freelancers with client projects; provides comprehensive support from independence to project participation including tax filing and consulting services
2. Worker Dispatch Services: Dispatching IT engineers to corporate clients; licensed dispatch service (派13-315972, 派13-310777) with margin-based pricing
3. Venture Investment and Support: Investment and support for early-to-mid stage venture companies in IT sector; includes funding, product development, and recruitment support

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

NKC Asia, through its wholly-owned subsidiary 株式会社テックビズ, operates the Techbiz platform, Japan's largest IT freelance job matching service, connecting IT freelancers with corporate project opportunities and providing end-to-end support including tax filing, business credit cards (Techbiz Gold Card), and welfare/benefits services. The company also provides IT engineer dispatch and recruitment placement (Development Support) under licensed worker dispatch (派 13-315972 / 派 13-310777) and fee-based employment placement (13-ユ-314106 / 13-ユ-309563) operations, and offers venture capital, product development, and recruitment support to early and mid-stage IT startups.

Product overview

NKC Asia operates a platform-plus-services model centered on IT freelancer support. The core product is テックビズ (Techbiz), a comprehensive ecosystem that includes the job matching platform テックビズフリーランス, complemented by ancillary services such as テックビズゴールドカード (business credit card), テックビズライフサポート (welfare/benefits), and テックビズメディア (information portal). The company also operates international talent matching through meet.jobs and HRBIZ for HR professionals. Additionally, NKC Asia provides development support services and has invested in venture companies (freecracy, Alpaca.Lab, ELSOUL LABO) while maintaining partnerships with coworking space providers like いいオフィス.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• テックビズフリーランス: Japan's largest IT freelancer job matching platform offering independent support, tax services, and business gold card
• meet.jobs
• HRBIZ
• いいオフィス

Products and services

• Techbiz Freelance (テックビズフリーランス) Japan's largest dedicated IT freelance job matching platform; connects IT freelancers with corporate project opportunities and provides end-to-end support from independence through project execution, including dedicated consultant support.
• Techbiz Gold Card (テックビズゴールドカード) Business credit card designed specifically for IT freelancers, offering competitive cashback (up to 1.1%) and first-year-free annual fee.
• Techbiz Life Support (テックビズライフサポート) Welfare and benefits service for IT freelancers providing access to partner services and a point rewards system.
• Development Support (開発支援) IT engineer dispatch and recruitment placement services for corporate clients under licensed worker dispatch (派 13-310777) and fee-based employment placement (13-ユ-309563); flexible contract arrangements handled by specialized consultants.
• IT Venture Support (ITベンチャー支援) End-to-end support for domestic and international seed and early/mid-stage IT venture companies, including funding, product development, and recruitment assistance. Portfolio includes freecracy, Alpaca.Lab, ELSOUL LABO, and ii-office.

Quantifiable outcome

• Monthly matching volume of 10,000+ person-months of IT projects annually
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers5 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature1 record

Partnerships

Two partnerships are on record, tiered core and flagship.

• 東京大学エコノミックコンサルティング株式会社 (UTEcon)coreTechnology or Integration · 4 August 2021Collaboration with UTEcon (Tokyo University Economic Consulting) to improve IT freelance job matching accuracy using machine learning-based natural language processing. UTEcon provides NLP technology and economics expertise to optimize matching efficiency and pricing strategies.
• 株式会社いいオフィス (ii-office)flagshipStrategic or Co-development Partner · 5 January 2021Capital and business partnership with ii-office, Japan's largest coworking space operator (273+ locations nationwide). Techbiz members receive up to 5% points back on coworking fees. Partnership supports flexible workstyle for IT freelancers.

Scale indicators8 records

Recent moves15 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Regional players

• Toptal: Toptal is a global premium freelance platform focused on elite software engineers; it competes with Techbiz for high-end IT talent, especially for Japanese enterprises seeking offshore engineers.
• Upwork: Upwork is the largest global online freelance marketplace; while it operates primarily outside Japan, it competes indirectly with Techbiz for cross-border IT freelancer engagements and represents the international peer benchmark.

Emerging players

• Wantedly: Wantedly operates a Japanese talent-matching and employer-branding platform focused on tech professionals, with adjacent overlap to Techbiz in connecting IT talent with project/employer opportunities.
• Forkwell: Forkwell is a Japanese tech-talent community and job-matching platform for engineers, with meaningful overlap to NKC Asia's Techbiz in serving IT freelancers seeking projects and companies hiring engineering talent.

Broad incumbents

• Persol Holdings: Persol is one of Japan's largest staffing groups (Tempstaff, Persol Tempstaff, doda), offering IT engineer dispatch and placement services that overlap with NKC Asia's dispatch and matching business.
• TechnoPro Holdings: TechnoPro is a leading Japanese IT engineer dispatch and outsourcing firm with thousands of contracted engineers, directly competing with NKC Asia's dispatch/SES operations in the Japan market.
• Recruit Holdings: Recruit Holdings is Japan's largest HR/staffing conglomerate (Indeed, Recruit Agent, Staff Service) and a broad incumbent that competes with NKC Asia across permanent placement, dispatch, and freelance IT staffing.

Direct peers

• geechs: geechs is a Japanese IT freelancer/contractor matching platform focused on engineers and designers, directly competing with Techbiz for both freelance talent and corporate IT staffing clients.
• Lancers: Lancers operates Japan's largest general freelance/crowdsourcing platform, directly competing with Techbiz in IT freelancer matching and serving overlapping SMB and enterprise clients in Japan.
• CrowdWorks: CrowdWorks runs a major Japanese crowdsourcing and freelance matching platform, competing directly with Techbiz for IT freelancers and project-based work from Japanese enterprises.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/nkc.asia

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Subsidiaries3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments3 records

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about NKC Asia