Sony lets employees pitch new businesses — First Flight crowdfunds them

By 2014, Sony's divisional structure made it hard for employees' radical ideas to become products. CEO Kazuo Hirai set up the Seed Acceleration Program as a president-direct project to accelerate new business creation and give young developers end-to-end business experience.

Open auditions let any employee pitch a business; winners work full-time and prove demand on Sony's own crowdfunding platform instead of climbing the divisional ladder.

Employees pitched in two audition rounds; winners ran their venture full-time, with the idea's lead taking a general-manager post over the whole product. In July 2015 Sony opened First Flight, a crowdfunding-plus-e-commerce site, launching MESH DIY kits, the e-paper FES Watch, and the HUIS remote.

Launch products reached real customers directly: HUIS raised over ¥10 million in crowdfunding and moved to productization, while MESH went on general sale. By early 2019 the renamed Sony Startup Accelerator Program had incubated 34 ideas and turned 14 into businesses.

In 2014 Sony was a giant whose best ideas could still die inside divisional boundaries. CEO Kazuo Hirai made new-business creation a president-direct project and set up the Seed Acceleration Program (SAP): any employee with a business idea could audition, and passing two rounds of auditions earned the right to work on the venture full-time.

SAP kept the person behind the idea in charge. Winners did not hand their project to a strategy department; the lead took a general-manager role and ran the product from development to market, gaining end-to-end business experience. Sony also opened a Creative Lounge on the ground floor of its headquarters for project teams and external partners.

In July 2015 Sony added First Flight, a platform combining crowdfunding and e-commerce, so internal ventures could test real market demand and talk directly with customers. Launch products included MESH smart DIY kits, the e-paper FES Watch, and the HUIS remote; HUIS raised over ¥10 million in crowdfunding and moved toward production.

Sony framed the move as a return to its start-up roots: 'Nothing embodies this spirit more than passionate entrepreneurs who give shape to their ground-breaking ideas.' The program turned internal innovation from a staff function into a customer-validated, public process.

Open auditions gave any employee a route to build a business, not just engineers in R&D or senior managers.

Full-time venture status and end-to-end ownership kept the person with the idea in charge of the product and its business case.

Crowdfunding on Sony's own platform validated demand with real customer money before the company scaled or killed a project.

Operating outside the divisional ladder protected radical ideas from internal politics and budget fights.

When bureaucracy kills ideas, build a parallel track: auditions plus a direct-to-customer channel let internal ventures prove demand, while the person who pitched keeps end-to-end ownership.

HUIS moved to productization after its First Flight campaign, MESH reached general sale, and FES Watch became a real e-paper watch line. By early 2019 the program had incubated 34 ideas and 14 became businesses, including the wena smartwatch line, Aromastic and the AeroSense drone startup; Sony renamed it the Sony Startup Accelerator Program and opened it to external entrepreneurs. The model itself became a product: since October 2018 Sony sells its acceleration know-how to other companies and universities, passing 605 service cases by end-2023.