Nao is Director of Impact Frontiers, responsible for strategy, operations, and external relations.
Prior to Impact Frontiers, she worked for the Japan Exchange Group for 15 years. In the first half of her career, she engaged in listed company compliance. After receiving her MBA from Wharton, she was promoted to manager of corporate strategy in which she specialized in new business development and organizational change. She led a number of projects, including company-wide organizational change and an accelerator program aimed at creating new business and innovation and business proposals aimed at promoting sustainable investment within the securities market.
Her interest in impact investing was sparked by her internship at the Impact Investment Exchange Asia. Since then, she has been actively involved in Social Innovation and Impact Foundation and Global Steering Group for Impact Investment Japan, the two major organizations taking a leadership role in promoting impact investing in Japan. She has facilitated working groups with more than 30 institutional investors and main authored GSG publications such as “Issues and Recommendations for Impact Companies Using Capital Markets”, "Principles for Impact Measurement and Management in Impact Investing: a Guide for Fund Managers” and “Guidebook for Impact Measurement and Management for Impact Investment” She also launched ImpactShare, which provides Japanese investors and business professionals with information on leading global practices and business cases. The newsletter is subscribed by 500+ business professionals. In 2021, she published her first book “Introduction to Impact Investing” from Nikkei.
Nao holds an MBA from the Wharton School, a Graduate Certificate of Innovation and Entrepreneurship from Stanford University and a BA from Keio University.
