Ocean Inc.

Ocean Inc. (株式会社Ocean) is a Tokyo company that builds software for Japan's tax-free shopping system. Its main product is Ocean Tax Refund, a refund-type duty-free platform for retailers who sell to overseas visitors. On 9 October 2026 the venture capital firm Global Brain announced an investment in Ocean through its KURONEKO Innovation Fund 2.

What Ocean does

Ocean Tax Refund handles the electronic paperwork that a duty-free sale to a visitor requires. Staff install an app on a smartphone or tablet, so no dedicated terminal is needed. Ocean says the service supports more than 30 currencies and several languages, and that it gives retailers free APIs, SDKs and DLLs for connecting to point-of-sale systems.

Japan is changing its duty-free rules in November 2026, moving from tax exemption at the till to a refund paid when the visitor leaves the country. Ocean says its system switches to the new rules automatically after the change. It also offers help with registering a shop as a duty-free seller with the local tax office, and with moving over from another vendor's system.

A second line of business is visitor marketing. Ocean distributes coupons to overseas tourists and says it plans to grow this into a marketing platform that uses purchase data.

Who Ocean serves

The service is aimed at shops and tourism businesses in Japan that sell to inbound visitors. A shop that is already registered as a duty-free seller can start in about two weeks, according to Ocean; a new registration usually takes one to two months.

For retailers there is no initial or monthly fee. Ocean charges a system fee of 1.55 per cent of the duty-free sale, which its service page says is collected from the visitor. Coupon campaigns carry no set-up or monthly fee, with a percentage fee on sales that come through a coupon.

Key facts

• Founded: May 2024
• Headquarters: Chuo-ku, Tokyo
• Product: Ocean Tax Refund, with a coupon and visitor-referral service
• Funding: investment from Global Brain's KURONEKO Innovation Fund 2, announced 9 October 2026; the amount was not disclosed. Yamato Holdings is the fund's limited partner
• Websites: ocean.inc and service.ocean.inc