Climbers Advance to Finals of Osaka, Japan Pitching Festival

Climbers, which operates 'Chopsticks,' an art commerce platform for independent Asian artists, was selected as one of the final 8 teams at the '2025 Osaka Pitching Festival (StARTs UPs)' and successfully conducted its final pitching. This event, held on July 23rd in Osaka, Japan, was part of the 'Osaka-Kansai International Art Festival (Osaka-Kansai Expo 2025)' and was held under the theme of 'Connecting Art, Society, and Technology'. Among over 77 applicant companies worldwide, only 8 made it to the final stage to get the opportunity to present, and Climbers was one of them. Climbers presented under the theme of 'Global Art Commerce Connecting Tastes with AI Curation', introducing an innovative platform that analyzes customer preference data to recommend personalized content and products from independent artists. This model, effectively combining content and commerce, garnered significant attention. In the networking session that followed the pitching, Climbers discussed in-depth collaboration possibilities with local art distribution stakeholders, lifestyle concept store operators, and content platform representatives from Japan, confirming a positive reception in the Japanese market. Seo Kang-seok, CEO of Climbers, stated, "Through this pitching, we confirmed the high potential for emotion and creativity-based commerce in the Japanese market, and were able to initiate practical collaboration discussions with local companies." He further expressed his ambition, "Using this achievement as a stepping stone, we will actively pursue entry into the Japanese market and establish a local cooperation system." Climbers plans to leverage this presentation as an opportunity to execute specific Japanese market entry strategies, including planning collaborative content with Japanese artists, testing offline retail pop-ups, and discussing partnerships for local platform entry. Ultimately, it plans to solidify its position as a core commerce infrastructure that helps Asia-based creators enter the global market.