Hatena to set up subsidiary in Silicon Valley

Hatena Co., a recognized leader in the Japanese Web services market, was
founded in July 2001 in Kyoto, Japan and moved to Tokyo in April, 2003.
Hatena now has 21 employees, and offers 13 web-based services including its
highly popular weblog hosting and social bookmarking services. Hatena's web
site (www.hatena.ne.jp) currently has about 8 million visitors per month and
430K registered users, almost 100% of which are Japanese.

The company has become one of the most desired places to work at due to its
highly innovative and dynamic culture.

Hatena Inc. was established in the U.S. with the following objectives:

1. Expand its audience and offerings to the global market
2. Research cutting-edge Internet and other computing technologies
3. Develop relationships with leading US Internet companies

Junya Kondo, CEO of Hatena Co., will also assume the office of CEO of Hatena
Inc. Hatena Co. will continue to run its operations and business from their
Tokyo headquarters.

According to Junya Kondo:

"Since we moved our offices from Kyoto to Tokyo, we've expanded our business
significantly, and have released many services such as 'Hatena Bookmark.
But all of those services, while providing us with most of our revenues,
were based on ideas conceived and developed in Kyoto. To accelerate our
innovation and pursue our mission of providing valuable and meaningful
services to the world, I believe we need to interact and learn from the
world leaders of internet technology, both individuals and companies,
located in Silicon Valley"

Media contact:
Reiko Kondo
hatenapr@hatena.ne.jp