100% free, weekly

The playbook for building a business abroad.

Unlock the blueprint behind foreigners running $1M+ businesses and start building yours today.

100K+
Viewers
1,800+
Subscribers
★ 4.9
Reader rating
Ambition Abroad
Tue · May 19
Blueprint №018 — Sendai, Japan

How a Canadian founder built one of Japan's biggest supplement brands.

  1. 01 The first 90 days: choosing a city, not just a country.
  2. 02 How he structured the company (and what he'd undo).
  3. 03 The supplier conversation that 10x'd margins.
  4. 04 What "fitting in" actually costs you as a founder.
7 min read · Reader: founders & operators
Issue №018
Free · Weekly
Recent blueprints

Real

Michia Rohrssen $110M founder

Why this $110M founder left Silicon Valley to build in Japan

Michia Rohrssen breaks down:

  • How to build a company worth selling
  • Raising $21M from investors
Subscriber Exclusive
Oya Koc $1M+ App

The Turkish founder turning real-time translation into a $1M+ app

Oya Koc breaks down:

  • Raising from Japanese VCs as a foreigner
  • Solving the new-marketplace cold-start problem
Subscriber Exclusive
Kim Harase 900 cups / day

Inside Tokyo's 900-cups-a-day café (started by two New Zealanders)

Kim Harase breaks down:

  • Choosing a café location that prints money
  • Hiring local staff with zero language on day one
Subscriber Exclusive
Mike Sunda $10M agency

How this foreigner built a $10M creative agency in Tokyo

Mike Sunda breaks down:

  • Winning Japanese enterprise clients as an outsider
  • Building a creative team that bridges two cultures
Subscriber Exclusive
Read the full archive →
From the community

Read by builders just like you.

Founders, operators, and people still figuring out the move. From Lisbon to Bangkok to São Paulo.

Finally a show that treats expat entrepreneurship seriously. The newsletter gave me more useful information than six months of Googling.
Alex W.
Bangkok, Thailand
What I love most is the lack of fluff. Every issue answers a question I was actually paying for answers to.
Devika S.
Singapore
I came for the Japan stories. I stayed because the frameworks apply to where I'm building — São Paulo.
Lucas P.
São Paulo, Brazil
The only newsletter I open every week. Dense, honest, and actionable. The visa and incorporation breakdowns alone are worth subscribing for.
James T.
Toronto, Canada
Watched the café episode twice. Took notes. We're four months into opening our own spot in Lisbon.
Ronan O.
Lisbon, Portugal
The kind of newsletter where you forward it to your spouse because it explains something you can't articulate yet.
Sara K.
Amsterdam, NL
I was on the fence about moving to Japan. One episode basically made the decision for me.
Maria C.
Lisbon, Portugal
The honesty is what hooked me. Most expat content is either Bali fantasy or visa spreadsheets. This is neither.
Nikolai V.
Berlin, Germany
Best decision I made this year was subscribing. Second best was reaching out to two of the founders featured.
Hiroshi T.
Osaka, Japan
Takumi Shyegun, host of Ambition Abroad

The mission

When I moved to Japan from Sydney at 21, I couldn't find anything about how to actually build a business abroad.

Everything was travel, lifestyle, or surface-level advice. Nothing about real people running real businesses. So I built what I wish existed.

Each episode follows a founder who left home and built something that actually works. No lifestyle content. No vague inspiration. Just real decisions, real mistakes, and real playbooks.

The newsletter is where it goes deeper. Full breakdowns, real numbers, and the lessons you can apply. This is the resource I needed at 21.

Stop overthinking

Start building.

Real founders. Real numbers. Real playbooks. Free, every week.