Bizmates Inc., a Tokyo company listed on the Growth market of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, said on October 5, 2026 that it would make With The World Inc. a subsidiary. With The World is a Kobe startup that runs online international exchange classes for Japanese schools. Bizmates signed a share transfer agreement and a share exchange agreement on the same day, according to Nihon M&A Center's deal news service.
Bizmates acquired 90.7% of With The World's voting rights on October 16. It plans a simplified share exchange on October 30 that will make the startup a wholly owned subsidiary. In a press release on PR TIMES dated October 19, Bizmates confirmed that With The World had joined the group.
Bizmates' release did not state a price. M&A Online, a Japanese deal-news site, reported that the shares cost about ¥200 million (about $1.3 million). Neither company confirmed that figure in the release. Under the share exchange, the remaining holders receive 1,073.875 Bizmates shares for each With The World share, according to M&A Online and Nihon M&A Center. The release did not mention any change to With The World's name, brand or team.
What With The World built
With The World was founded on April 2, 2018 in Kobe, Hyogo Prefecture, and is led by its president, Shunta Igarashi. It designs and runs online exchange classes and overseas study programmes. In the classes, Japanese students talk in English with peers abroad about the Sustainable Development Goals and other social issues, and work with them on possible solutions. The company handles the whole process, from arranging partner schools overseas to running the lessons. It is also registered as an agent for travel and non-life insurance, which supports its study-abroad trips.
Bizmates said With The World works with a network of more than 500 local schools in 67 countries. It serves Japanese students from elementary school to university and supports more than 20,000 learners a year. In fiscal 2026 it was hired by Japan's Ministry of the Environment to run an international workshop on environmental issues, and it was selected for EDU-Port Nippon, a support project run by the education ministry. It also took the grand prize, the CVC prize and the audience prize at a grand prix of past winners of the Youth Co:Lab Social Innovation Challenge Japan 2025, a programme run by the UNDP and the Citi Foundation.
M&A Online reported that With The World had revenue of ¥188 million (about $1.25 million), operating profit of ¥10 million (about $67,000) and net assets of ¥100 million (about $670,000) in the year to March 2026.
The founder
Igarashi traced the idea for the company to his student years. ASCII STARTUP reported that he spent about five months coaching tennis in Southeast Asia and spending time with local children, and Bizmates' release links the idea to time he spent with children in the Philippines. Before he founded With The World, he worked in sales at the staffing group Pasona and helped launch six new businesses there, according to ASCII STARTUP.
Early on, the company used video calls to connect classrooms. In May 2020, ASCII STARTUP reported, it linked Japanese schools with classes in Indonesia, Myanmar, the Philippines and Cambodia over Skype and Zoom, and ran a weekly online 'Chat Time' class for elementary pupils that cost 500 yen a session.
The sources did not report any outside funding rounds, investors or a headcount for With The World. M&A Online listed Igarashi among the people who sold shares.
Why Bizmates is buying
Bizmates was founded on July 3, 2012 and is based in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo. Its president is Nobuaki Suzuki. Its main product is an online English service aimed at business people, and it reports a language-solutions segment and a talent-solutions segment. The company said it is building out its global business and moving into new areas under the theme of diversity, and that it wants to use acquisitions for what it called discontinuous growth.
The deal gives Bizmates a route into schools and local governments. Bizmates said it expects to reach new customers through With The World's ties with schools and municipalities. It also pointed to rising demand for inquiry-based and problem-solving lessons in Japanese schools under the government's GIGA School programme. M&A Online added that the purchase should help Bizmates with problem-based learning and lend it credibility through With The World's government work.
In the release, Suzuki said in Japanese that he agreed strongly with With The World's view that English study should not be the goal in itself. He argued that as generative AI lowers language barriers, what matters more is whether people with different values can understand each other and create something together. Igarashi said, also in Japanese, that joining the group was a major step toward taking the collaborative learning his company built in schools to university students, working adults, companies and local governments.
What the companies plan together
Bizmates listed several joint projects. They include international collaborative learning programmes sold to schools, municipalities and corporate clients; programmes in which company employees and students work on social issues together; and larger overseas training programmes that draw on both companies' networks in the Philippines.
With The World is the second company Bizmates has bought this year. In June 2026 it acquired Hipstergate, a firm that provides corporate training and diversity, equity and inclusion services. M&A Online listed that deal at ¥211 million (about $1.4 million).
