I worked in Watami Food Service Co., Ltd. after my university days. Marking my seventh year in the company in 2007, I was sent to Hong Kong to work in their branch office. After that, I became the representative director of Watami (China) Co., Ltd. in 2011. And then, from 2013, I was appointed as the head of Human Resources & Sales Planning of Watami International and became the in-charge of the marketing in all branches across Asia and of overall management of its personnel.
Earnestly, I have started learning Cantonese since I came to Hong Kong. It is not too much to say that I studied the most in my life and spent a great amount of time on it.
At the end of 2014, I quit my job in Watami and started G-JOYFUL LIMITED. I was 37 at that time.
I had a vague image of becoming a bridge between Japan and abroad, but I did not have enough funds. I started by listing up all of the services that I can offer at the present time as well as services that do not need much cost and materialized them one by one.
First, I acquired a qualification to become an insurance agent in Hong Kong and started handling insurance products using all the knowledge I have that time in accounting and finance. I planned on developing businesses from the money I saved out of handling insurances.
As we went through the hard times in the second year, I let my family go back to Japan and focused on learning the business. Looking back to the time, I believe that it was the time when I begun to have a grim determination.
Of course, each of the services in this job is important, but personal connections also matter because it is a business based on trust, not to mention that our partners are Japanese companies. I have been out of Japan for eight years when I started my business, so I did not have any strong connections there. I had to build my network from scratch.
Without strong connections in the country, I was helped by two people that I call my benefactors. The first one was an employee of our company, the one who initially proposed about insurance business. The second one is the founder of Watami. They trusted me at the beginning when the situation was quite difficult to keep operating, and he spent lots of money to buy insurance from me. Therefore, it is not an exaggeration if I say that G-JOYFUL LIMITED became what it is today because of their trust.
I really think that I am blessed to be surrounded with good people. The same is true when I am in Hong Kong. I am blessed to be around good people at work, so I am really enjoying every bit of it. I am very thankful that they are able to express their opinions clearly unlike most Japanese workers, and they are also brilliant at doing their job. They also work very fast, and I believe it is because people in Hong Kong put importance to productivity when working. Meanwhile, Japanese workers excel in politeness and courteousness.
Japan and Hongkong are both international financial centers. And it is my pleasure to be able to discover a lot of good points from each country.
Our company, which helps businesses expand overseas, grew remarkably, and as a result of meeting our clients' expectations in corporate establishment, account opening, visa acquisition, business support, and assets management, referrals come one after the other, boosting our popularity through word of mouth. We were able to improve our situation by accumulating experiences and good record, and we were able to increase our services from it.
Hong Kong has more leeway in terms of taxation and regulations compared to Japan, therefore maintaining a business-friendly environment. Japan's corporation tax rate is very high compared to the rest of the countries in the world, and it is definitely one of the reasons why there are increasing overseas expansion among Japanese companies. Also, one of the advantages in expanding in Hong Kong is that, it allows easy access to other Asian countries.
Currently, we are aiming to triple the number of our clients by 2020. Also, we have recently co-founded General Sherman Financial Group with a partner from Hong Kong, and our near-term goal is to get the company listed on GEM (Growth Enterprise Market, a market for emerging companies in Hong Kong) by 2023. We have also established a real estate company in Japan that refers properties to clients from Hong Kong. Our ultimate dream is to introduce cultures by bringing what is good from abroad to Japan, and by bringing traditional crafts from Japan to abroad, and to build a business that will further shorten the gap between Japan and other countries.
In Hong Kong, they have activities involving intercountry exchange with young representatives of Japanese companies. I would like to show to them that like me, they can have this as one of their options in the future. I would like to a model, not as someone from afar, but as a realistic model that they can see right next to them. I believe that it is also my duty to pave the way for younger people in Japan to go out and exchange culture with other countries.
