It’s the perfect time to visit Kyoto, Japan, as Ghibli Park opened less than an hour away from the city last November 1st. The new Park features some of your favorite animated scenes and characters from Studio Ghibli films.

During an event a few days before the park’s official opening, Studio Ghibli Co. chairman and president Koji Hoshino said that the start of the park has a significant meaning for them that surpasses almost three years of the pandemic.

Overall, the final design for Ghibli Park encompassed some 17.5 acres and was split into five distinct areas. Ghibli’s Grand Warehouse, the park’s centerpiece, is a huge indoor “town” with streets, displays, and reproductions of Studio Ghibli’s “Totoro” and “The Catbus from Outer Space” sets. The Ghibli Museum’s theater shows special short films to visitors of the new park and Tokyo’s Ghibli Museum.

There are also two restaurants, a souvenir shop, a vintage shopping district with lanes, and a play area for children. The “Hill of Youth” antique shop from “Whisper of the Heart” and “The Cat Returns” is the second tourist attraction. The park can be seen in its entirety from this vantage point.

The third and newest section of the park is the Dondoko Forest, which is themed after the anime film “My Neighbor Totoro.” Both the bouncy house and a Totoro-themed playground can be found there.

Valley of Witches will feature elements from “Howl’s Moving Castle,” about a young milliner who accidentally gets caught up in a war, and “Kiki’s Delivery Service,” about an earnest and hardworking young witch. 

According to the director and son of Studio Ghibli co-founder Hayao Goro Miyazaki, the park was conceived with the local community in mind. Miyazaki’s original intention for the site was to be a park, not a typical theme park with rides and attractions. He desires that the people of Aichi share his passion for their gardens, as he believes parks are primarily for the local community.

Check out their official website for ticket and booking information.

Shippit has announced that it will pay $18 million to buy the logistics SaaS platform Luwjistik, based in Singapore. 

Founded by longtime friends William On and Rob Hango-Zada in 2014, with a mission to improve shipping for small businesses, as they have personally experienced the drawbacks of online shopping.

After two years of operations in the region for the Sydney-based company, the Australian logistics tech company co-founder and co-CEO William On has relocated to Singapore to lead the new expansion and manage the existing 50-person Luwjistik team.

This comes after the company raised $65 million in Series B2 funding, which helped operations in Southeast Asia, and almost seven months after it bought the last mile logistics tech platform Premonition.

Shippit’s inclusion of Luwjistik’s co-founders, who bring extensive industry experience and connections to the table, is expected to revolutionize the company’s approach. The acquisition of Luwjistik will also enable the company to provide tailored solutions for the Southeast Asian market. Therefore, Shippit can be the best option for many who manage their warehouse or search for a logistics partner.

The startup works with carriers such as Ninja Van, J&T Express, and JNE Express, as well as logistics companies such as Maersk, POS Malaysia, Lion Parcel, and Summer International.

Within a month of launching Luwjistik, the duo raised US$1.1 million (AUD$1.7 million) in a seed round led by East Ventures, including MDI-Arise Finches and Global Founders Capital.

William anticipated a significant increase in e-commerce in Southeastern Asia, which will continue if Shippit and Luwjistik join forces. Currently, they can provide a one-stop platform for enterprises and the expanding SME segment, particularly in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand.

More than 40 million deliveries were booked via the Shippit platform in the fiscal year 2022. Since its inception in 2014, Sydney-based Shippit has fulfilled e-commerce orders worth $5.5 billion for more than 3,500 retailers.

“I strongly believe that by combining our strengths, we can continuously innovate and offer the most impactful, reliable, and relevant solutions to a fast-changing, dynamic market.” – William shared with Business News Australia.

When the pandemic struck, all Chrisanti Indiana wanted to do was help her family and create jobs in her community.

Nonetheless, as the pandemic worsened, each day appeared to be a gamble. She gambled on her dreams, created her employment opportunity, and risked everything for her family because she had no safety or security options.

The Indonesian co-founder, and chief marketing officer of Social Bella, surprised everyone by taking her successful online store offline. In 2019, her online beauty and personal care store, Sociolla, already had two physical locations in Indonesia. It currently operates 47 outlets in Indonesia and 16 in Vietnam, making its earnings multiplied by ten by the end of 2021.

It started after Indiana had finished her studies in Australia in 2015 when she moved back to Jakarta, where she conceived the idea for Sociolla.

Chrisanti found that Australia was a great place to stock up on her favorite cosmetics because of the abundance of international brands. There couldn’t have been a bigger contrast with Indonesia.

With a combined $13,000, Indiana, her brother, and a close friend founded Social Bella to provide customers with access to legitimate goods and services.

“Since we started, we ensure that we only work with authorized distributors or brand owners,” Indiana said. 

The three founders of Sociolla had bigger plans than just building an online store. They have expanded beyond offline stores to become a global beauty and personal care product distributor. In Indonesia, they also became an associate partner for numerous international brands.

‘We want to ensure that we are scaling up and reaching more and more consumers. If Social Bella becomes a unicorn, it’s a bonus.” – Chrisanti Indiana shared with CNBC.