Dr. Semmoto is a successful entrepreneur in telecommunication industry, with more than 30 years in senior management positions with leading Japanese telecommunication companies.
His career began when he joined Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation (NTT, Japan) in 1966, staying until 1983. After favorably campaigning for a deregulated telecom industry in Japan, he co-founded the first private telecom startup, DDI, now KDDI Corporation in 1984, whose market cap is approximately $ 85 billion.
After its IPO, he left the company to become a Professor of Entrepreneurship at Keio University, Tokyo, Japan in 1996 as well as a Visiting Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon University and a Research Fellow at Stanford University.
In 1999, Dr. Semmoto founded and served as CEO of eAccess, Ltd. an Internet access startup that commercialized Japan’s DSL market and went on to capture the second-largest global market share. Following the IPO of eAccess in 2004, he founded and became CEO of EMOBILE, which became Japan’s fourth largest mobile network operator. EMOBILE and eAccess were sold to SoftBank in 2013. Following this he served as Chairman Emeritus of RENOVA, a pioneering Japanese renewable energy company until March 2024.
In 2017, Dr. Semmoto established The Frances & Sachio Semmoto Foundation aims to provide financial assistance to talented students of demonstrated financial need from Asia Pacific nations, who seek to pursue postsecondary education in Japan.
In 2023, Dr. Semmoto established Walking Together Hand-in-Hand with Children Foundation to support abused children financially and mentally.
In the past, he served several international outside board members of world class companies, including NetApp, a leading storage company in Silicon Valley (US) and Reuters Shareholding Company, a world first class communication company (UK).