natureasia.com is the Asia-Pacific portal of Nature Portfolio, operated by Springer Nature Japan K.K. The company traces to two predecessors, Springer Japan K.K., formed in 1983, and Nature Japan K.K., formed in 1987, which later merged. The parent group came together in 2015 when Springer Science+Business Media combined with Holtzbrinck Publishing Group's Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Macmillan, and Macmillan Education, and the Japanese arm began operating under the Springer Nature name on 1 March 2016. The exact launch date of the natureasia.com domain is not publicly confirmed. Springer Nature employs roughly 200 staff in Japan across editorial, sales, marketing, production, custom media, and healthcare services. Today, natureasia.com is mainly focused on Japanese-language translations of Nature and Nature-family research abstracts and highlights, the monthly Nature Digest, Nature Index research performance data, regional science coverage from across the Asia-Pacific, research job listings, and localized author and publishing services, from their base in Tokyo, Japan. One interesting fact: Nature Portfolio designed and produced a set of 32 LINE messaging stickers featuring two recurring characters, Lablab and Nano Kitty, following their misadventures in and out of the laboratory.