With a view to creating new start-ups using of their intellectual property and research, Kyoto University has begun to recruit external personnel known as ‘visiting entrepreneurs.’ This system, managed by Kyoto University Innovation Capital (Kyoto iCAP), involves welcoming people with a wealth of experience as entrepreneurs and giving them the role of implementing the technology held by Kyoto University into society.

At present, three visiting entrepreneurs are active. The first company has already been launched by the program — Rhinoflux, which is developing environmentally-friendly technology that generates power while capturing CO2. This uses a technique called ‘chemical looping,’ originally researched by Ryuichi Ashida, a lecturer at Kyoto University's Graduate School of Engineering. Rhinoflux is aiming to develop a prototype with a power generation capacity of around 1 kilowatt by the end of the year, with a team of eight engineers at its core.

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