Japan’s Kawaijuku backs Do Ventures to enter Vietnam’s education market

Japan’s education companies are increasingly looking beyond a home market shaped by a shrinking population. Kawaijuku, one of the country’s larger private education providers, is taking a venture-capital route into Vietnam.

KJ Holdings, the holding company of the Japanese education group, has invested in Do Ventures Fund II, a fund managed by Ho Chi Minh City-based Do Ventures. The size of the investment remains undisclosed.

The move gives Kawaijuku exposure to Vietnam’s startup and education sectors at a time when the country’s rising incomes, young workforce and intense focus on learning are creating room for new models in private education, skills training and technology-enabled learning.

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Rather than entering the market through a single school, acquisition or franchise partnership, Kawaijuku is using Do Ventures as a bridge into the local ecosystem. The company said it aims to build relationships with startups and businesses in education and talent development, with a view to future business partnerships, direct investments and the creation of new education services in Vietnam.

A fund as a market entry point

For a traditional education group, investing as a Limited Partner in a venture fund can be a slower but more informed way to enter a new market. It offers access to deal flow, founder networks and early signals on where demand is forming, without forcing a company to make an immediate operating bet.

That matters in Vietnam, where education demand is broad but fragmented. Parents spend heavily on tutoring, English-language learning and test preparation. Employers, meanwhile, are looking for workers with stronger digital, technical and communication skills as the country moves up the manufacturing value chain and attracts more foreign investment.

Do Ventures, founded in 2020 by Nguyen Manh Dung and Le Hoang Uyen Vy, invests in early-stage startups in Vietnam and Southeast Asia, typically from seed to Series A. Its areas of focus include consumer and manufacturing technology, artificial intelligence, education, healthcare, financial services and climate technology.

The firm’s first fund, launched in 2020, targeted US$50 million and counted NAVER, Sea and Vertex Holdings among its backers. Those names gave Do Ventures regional credibility early on, particularly as Vietnam began to draw more attention from investors looking beyond Singapore and Indonesia.

For Kawaijuku, the appeal is not only financial exposure. Do Ventures’s network could help the Japanese group understand how Vietnamese families, students and employers are adopting digital tools, where offline education still matters, and which business models can scale in a market where affordability remains important.

Why Vietnam matters to Japanese education groups

Kawaijuku’s overseas push comes against a difficult backdrop at home. Japan’s population decline has weighed on many domestic industries, and education is among the most exposed. Fewer children mean a smaller addressable market for test preparation, tutoring and other private learning services, even if competition for top schools and universities remains intense.

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Vietnam presents the opposite demographic story. The country has a population of around 100 million, a large working-age base and one of Southeast Asia’s more education-focused consumer cultures. Economic growth has also expanded the middle class, giving more families the ability to pay for supplementary learning.

The opportunity is not limited to children’s education. Vietnam is also under pressure to train talent for higher-value industries, including electronics, software, semiconductors, logistics and green manufacturing. As global supply chains diversify from China, Vietnam has become a major production hub for multinationals. That shift is creating demand for workers who can combine technical ability with language skills and problem-solving.

This is where Kawaijuku’s stated interest in education and talent development becomes important. The group is best known in Japan for academic preparation, but its future in Vietnam may not simply be about exporting Japanese-style cram schools. The bigger opportunity could lie in adapting its teaching methods, curriculum design and assessment expertise to local needs, whether through partnerships with schools, edutech startups or workforce-training providers.

Edutech’s post-pandemic reset

Kawaijuku is entering Southeast Asia’s education market at a more disciplined moment. During the pandemic, edutech startups across the region benefited from a surge in online learning, but the reopening of schools exposed weaknesses in purely digital models. Customer acquisition costs rose, engagement fell in some segments, and investors became more selective.

The result has been a shift towards hybrid models, outcome-based learning and products tied more clearly to employability. In Vietnam, this could mean English-learning platforms that combine online tools with coaching, test-prep businesses with adaptive-learning software, or vocational programmes aligned with employers.

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For venture firms such as Do Ventures, education is attractive because demand is durable. But it is also difficult. Education businesses often need trust, regulatory awareness, strong teacher networks and patience. In Southeast Asia, the most resilient players tend to blend technology with local distribution rather than assume that software alone can replace classrooms.

Here, a strategic investor such as Kawaijuku can be useful to the ecosystem. If it becomes an active partner rather than a passive capital provider, it could bring curriculum know-how, teacher-training experience and a long-term education lens to Vietnamese startups that are trying to move beyond growth-at-all-costs models.

A crowded field at home and abroad

Kawaijuku is not alone in seeing education as a regional growth opportunity. In Japan, it competes in a mature private education market with groups such as Benesse, Z-kai and Toshin, all of which have built strong brands around tutoring, correspondence learning, test preparation or digital study tools.

In Vietnam, the competitive landscape is different but no less active. Local and regional players such as EQuest, VUS, YOLA and Topica have targeted areas including English learning, K-12 education, test preparation and online training. Global edtech names also compete for attention, though many have found that localisation is essential in Southeast Asia.

This makes Kawaijuku’s fund investment a cautious and practical first step. Instead of assuming that Japanese education products can be transplanted wholesale, the company appears to be buying time, insight and relationships.

What to watch next

The investment also reflects a broader pattern in Southeast Asia’s startup market. As venture funding becomes more selective, strategic investors are playing a larger role. Corporates do not only bring capital; they can offer distribution, sector expertise and possible exit routes. For founders, that can be valuable, provided the strategic investor’s interests align with the startup’s growth plans.

Also Read: 48 PE investors, US$3.96B deployed, and not a single IPO exit in five years. Something is broken.

For Do Ventures, adding a Japanese education group to its investor base could strengthen its position in edutech and talent-related investments. It may also open doors between Vietnamese startups and Japanese companies looking for innovation, market access or workforce solutions in Southeast Asia.

For Kawaijuku, the success of the bet will depend less on the fund commitment itself and more on what follows. The company has signalled that it wants partnerships and direct investments. The harder task will be choosing where it can add real value in Vietnam’s fast-changing education market.

If it gets that right, the investment in Do Ventures Fund II may become more than a financial stake. It could become Kawaijuku’s first serious step towards building a Southeast Asian education business.