We—Nihon PMI Partners, Japan’s leading sector-specialized healthcare buyout fund—support companies alongside healthcare experts, including MDs.
This time, we’d like to share another investment case study. For our fifth installment, we feature YB Care Staff, which produced Japan’s first successful candidates under the Specific Skills visa program in the nursing care sector.
【Company Overview】
Core Businesses: Foreign Talent Recruitment for Healthcare and Nursing Care
History: YB Care Staff was newly established by carving out the nursing care introduction and staffing business from Yourbright’s foreign talent services.
【Reasons for Investment】
Impact thesis: Policy tailwinds enable scaling a high-quality nursing care talent pipeline amid Japan’s caregiver shortage.
Japan’s caregiving sector faces a severe labor shortage, with the effective job openings-to-applicants ratio for caregiving occupations remaining high at over 3:1 even now (significantly exceeding the average for all occupations), indicating a persistent structural supply shortage. Since the introduction of the Specified Skilled Worker (Care) program in 2019, approximately 28,000 workers have been employed, with approx. 135,000 expected to be accepted over the next five years (according to the Immigration Services Agency website). Furthermore, starting April 2025, foreign care workers holding Specified Skilled Worker or Technical Intern Training status who meet certain requirements will be permitted to work in “visiting services” such as home-visit care, institutionally expanding the use of foreign workers in the home-based care sector. Within this trend, YB Care Staff has accumulated high-quality matching capabilities and operational know-how through pioneering achievements in the care sector under the Specified Skilled Worker program (including producing the first successful candidates). We determined that this expertise could be scaled by translating it into a replicable system.
Return thesis: We believe our healthcare platform can accelerate value creation and enhance the enterprise value.
Through collaboration with our network, particularly in the home care and nursing sectors, we believe we can achieve stable business growth while enhancing the sustainability of regional care provision systems, thereby contributing to increased corporate value.
【Value Creation Initiatives at this Company】
Rebuilding the Sales Structure (Overcoming Immediate Post-Carveout Constraints for Repeatable Growth)
- Strengthening sales talent recruitment and expanding sales activities through advertising investment/seminar hosting
- Expanding bases in Kansai, Tokai, and Kanto (including Kanto expansion) while intensifying outreach in high-demand areas like the Tokyo metropolitan area
Improving Profit Margins
- Promote development of major care providers operating multiple facilities
- Enhance multiple referrals per client to improve profitability
Strengthening Supply Capacity (Balancing Quantity and Quality)
- Expand partnerships with local sending agencies and diversify sending countries (Bangladesh, Mongolia, Cambodia, etc.)
- Support supply and retention through care training collaborations and establishing an integrated follow-up system in partnership with Yourbright
【Future Outlook】
We will enhance corporate value through expanding our operational bases, strengthening sales capabilities, and systematizing operations, while also committing to resolving the staffing shortage—a key bottleneck in the caregiving field.