New visa (designated activity) for business start-up (METI)
Management type visa sets its criteria too stringent for a world talent to start up new business in Japan. This is because the type is rather for an already established business manager to enter into Japanese market.
To address this, a new type has been introduced in Dec 2018 as one of Designated Activity visa types. A to-be-a-business manager is now able to stay for upto a year while getting support from a registered municipal government for start-up.
The support from a municipal government is mandatory so that this visa type is granted to a talent who plans to start up business in a registered municipal government.
As of April 2019, five municipal governments are registered for this visa type: Fukuoka city, Aichi prefecture, Gifu prefecture, Kobe city and Osaka city. Tokyo government is not yet registered while it offers its own support program for business start ups.