Hiroto Kobayashi has been at the intersection of media, marketing, and tech industry for over 20 years. Former editor in chief of WIRED JAPAN magazine until 1994, he has since launched Gizmodo Japan and other influential media and portals. He founded INFOBAHN Inc. in 1998 and is considered one of the leaders in content marketing and owned media.

Recently he has been supporting open Innovation of global brands and municipalities, including a new partnership starting 2017 with TOA, an interdisciplinary tech conference based in Berlin. As an author, his latest work is “The Reason We Became the New Barbarian When Everything Got Wired,"(Shobunsha). Using his expertise in many genres, he is also supervisor of Japanese renditions of tomes such as Chris Anderson’s “FREE”, Jeff Jarvis’s “Public Parts” and more. He currently lectures at BBT university.