TOKYO - On the same day Matthew Thomas moved into his new apartment in Tokyo, he discovered he had no choice but to leave Japan.
"I laid on my floor for a week in shock, surrounded by boxes," said the 34-year-old American, recalling the moment he received confirmation from his lawyers that one of the new requirements for the business manager visa he was applying for was to have capital of 30 million yen ($189,000), up sixfold from 5 million yen.
In an instant, months of progress consulting with lawyers, taking Japanese language courses, acquiring permits and securing office space to realize his dream of opening a language exchange-themed cafe in Tokyo came undone.
Thomas arrived in Tokyo in January 2025. He came up with the idea for his business while conducting research, discovering that many Japanese people studying English, as well as foreigners studying Japanese in Japan, wanted more opportunities to practice speaking and comprehension.
At the same time, Thomas learned that Japan was a major coffee consumer and concluded there was a niche for him to open a cafe offering a space explicitly for language exchange.
He had experience with paid marketing strategy at a major U.S. e-commerce conglomerate, had saved a good amount of money and had a long-standing interest in Japan. He decided that the risk of starting a business in a new country was worth leaving the stability of corporate life in Los Angeles.
But like many of the estimated 45,000 business manager status holders in Japan by the end of June last year, Thomas had little warning of the drastic increase in the required capital for the visa, among other conditions.
"My goal was not to build some multinational conglomerate," Thomas said. "I wanted to build something that felt like it was run by local people for the community."
Last August, the Immigration Services Agency of Japan under the ruling Liberal Democratic Party proposed a revision of a ministerial ordinance regarding the visa, which came into effect that October.
In addition to the increased capital, some of the new visa requirements include employment of at least one full-time staff member, at least three years of management experience or equivalent education, Japanese language proficiency, and a physical workspace apart from the holder's residence.
Thomas applied to extend his provisional business manager visa in September while the old rules were still in effect. Although the extension was approved in October, the updated rules left him uncertain about what he would need to do to apply for a full visa in the near future.
Apparently caught off guard by the revision, Thomas' lawyers spent the next few months confirming whether holding 30 million yen in assets -- potentially obtained through a loan -- would satisfy the new requirements.
Eventually, Thomas was told that only capital would be accepted. Despite the government giving a three-year grace period to amass the funds, the amount proved to be far beyond his initial estimates. After more than a year, he decided to leave Japan.
"They want to be attractive to startups and innovation, but the rules don't allow that without an extraordinary level of friction," Thomas said recently from his family home in Connecticut after moving back in April.
Japan is facing a growing labor shortage crisis amid a shrinking population. Meanwhile, the crackdown on visas comes as reports of foreign nationals misusing public services or engaging in problematic behavior have attracted increasing attention.
The business manager visa came under particular scrutiny due to its relatively low bar to apply. An agency official said the changes were needed to ensure proper screening and prevent foreigners from abusing the system.
But at a press conference held in June to address the changes, Sakura Uchikoshi, an opposition lawmaker from the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, criticized the new requirements as "extremely difficult to meet, even for foreign residents who have faithfully followed the rules."
Uchikoshi highlighted that the revision process was swift after lawmakers from the LDP and the far-right populist Sanseito party raised concerns about the behavior of foreigners in Japan. She said, "The decision to tighten these requirements was highly political in nature."
Sanseito, which has advocated for tighter controls on foreign residents, significantly increased its parliamentary seats after gaining greater prominence with its "Japanese first" rhetoric in last summer's House of Councillors election.
This prompted other political parties, including the LDP, to address the issue of foreigners more consciously ahead of the House of Representatives election in February.
"With an election approaching, the Immigration Services Agency felt compelled to move forward with regulatory amendments at an unusually rapid pace, less than two months after publishing the draft proposal," said Kazuki Yuda, president of the Touch Immigration Law Firm, who was also at the press conference.
This month, the agency proposed tougher requirements for granting permanent residency to foreigners, including income above the average for Japanese households and a certain level of projected pension benefits.
Although no official required amount has been announced, average household income in Japan stood at 5.75 million yen in 2024, according to a welfare ministry survey on living conditions released in July.
Applicants would also be required to have projected pension benefits equivalent to what they would receive after 30 years of enrollment in the employees' pension program at their income level.
With Japan's foreign resident population exceeding 4 million for the first time this year -- about 3 percent of the country's population -- the proposed revisions would affect a far broader group than just business manager visa holders.
