Yoii Survey Finds RBF Awareness Gap Between Startups and SMEs
The survey puts a number on the RBF awareness gap, showing startups have begun moving from awareness to consideration while SMEs remain largely unaware, which frames the adoption problem for Yoii's Yoii Fuel product.
Reporting from 1 source: ASCII.jp.
Yoii, working with Teikoku Databank, surveyed 1,840 companies in April 2026 and drew 373 responses. RBF awareness reached 52.4% among startups but only 12.0% among SMEs, a gap of about 4.4 times. Some 88% of SMEs had never heard of RBF. Startups that knew the details came to 22.3% versus 3.2% for SMEs. Consideration for the next round hit 17.8% for startups and 6.2% for SMEs, while 2.8% of startups (three firms) had used RBF in the past two years.
The survey, run with Teikoku Databank, drew 373 responses from 1,840 companies contacted in April 2026. Among startups, the top fundraising pain points were review time (28.7%), cost (20.4%) and complicated procedures (17.6%), with equity dilution cited by 16.7%. SMEs mostly reported no active fundraising at all (31.3%), though cost concern ran close to startups at 21.1% versus 20.4%.
When asked why they would not consider RBF, 61.5% of SMEs said existing funding channels were sufficient. Startup reasons split across financial strategy mismatch (35.2%), cost (33.0%) and unfamiliarity with the mechanism (31.8%). Yoii, which offers the RBF product Yoii Fuel, said the results show awareness is the first hurdle for SMEs while startups have begun moving from awareness to consideration.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.