I want Tokyo to be a city where people build things together.
Tokyo has strong engineers, customers who pay, and investors with money to spend. Most AI events in Tokyo are talks. You sit in a chair for two hours, hear about agents and robots, and go home without writing a line of code. I wanted somewhere I could bring a half-finished project on a weeknight, sit next to other people working on theirs, and leave with something that runs. I couldn't find one, so I'm starting it. It's called +81 Builders.
I've spent the last few years in rooms like this in Europe. I won first place at the AI Tinkerers Ultimate Agent Hackathon against 140+ builders, then judged and spoke at nine AI hackathons in London, Berlin, Paris and Stockholm. Along the way I grew a developer community 6x. In each of those cities, a group of people met to build on a regular schedule, and some of them went on to start companies together. I'm native in Japanese and English, and I want that kind of room here.
AI has changed the maths too. One person with a laptop can now ship an agent in a weekend that does work a team used to do by hand, and the same models now run robots, cameras and sensors. That makes an evening in a room with other builders worth a lot more than it was five years ago.
How it works
We focus on two areas. The first is AI agents: software that plans, uses tools and finishes tasks without you steering each step. The second is physical AI, where models control robots and hardware out in the world. Japan makes a large share of the world's industrial robots, so Tokyo has a head start on the second one, and I want builders here to use it.
We run two events a month. At the build night, you bring a project, work on it next to other builders, and leave with more of it working than when you arrived. At the hackathon, you team up with people you met that morning and build something new in a day. Some hackathon teams keep going after the day ends and bring their project to the next build night, and people who first come to a build night often sign up for the next hackathon.
We speak Japanese and English in the same room. Good builders work in both languages, and I don't want to split them into separate events.
Saturday 17 October: Tokyo Agent Hackathon
Seventy builders are coming to Tokyo for our first hackathon, and every spot is taken. We'll announce the next build night and hackathon soon, and subscribers will hear first.
Building in public
I'm building +81 Builders in public. Follow me on LinkedIn to see how it's going week to week. This newsletter is where I'll announce upcoming build nights and hackathons, and share anything that helps you build: tools, credits, and introductions to people in the community.
Come to the next build night or hackathon when we announce it. If you're working on something, reply and tell me about it. I read the replies myself. If you know someone in Tokyo who should be in the room, forward this to them.
See you soon,
Jamie