Takashi Hibino was born in Gifu Prefecture in 1955, and joined Daiwa Securities in 1979, after graduating from the University of Tokyo’s Faculty of Law.

Following a position as bond dealer in the company’s Bond Department, he was then at the company’s office in the City of London for five years. After holding a variety of positions, including Head of Corporate Planning Department and Executive Officer in Charge of Equity, he was made a Director at Daiwa Securities Group in 2004. He was appointed as the company’s President and CEO in 2011, Chairperson of the Board in April 2017, and Special Advisor in April 2024. In July 2025, he was appointed as Chairman and CEO of the Japan Securities Dealers Association.

At Keidanren (Japan Business Federation) he served as Chair of the Committee on Financial and Capital Markets from 2018 to 2025 and as a Vice Chair of its Board of Councillors from 2019 to 2023. From December 2019 he was a member of the Radio Regulatory Council, an advisory council to the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications of Japan, and served as its Chair from March 2021 through December 2022.

Graduated from the University of Tokyo in 1997, and earned a Ph.D. in Engineering in 2002. He has held research positions at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology and served as a visiting researcher at Stanford University. Since 2007, he has been an associate professor, and since 2019, a professor at the University of Tokyo’s Graduate School of Engineering. His research specializes in artificial intelligence, deep learning, and web mining. He has served as the chairman of the Japan Deep Learning Association since 2017, an outside director of SoftBank Group Corporation since 2019, an expert member of the Council for Achieving New Capitalism and the chair of the AI Strategy Conference since 2023, the chair of the AI Institutional Study Group since 2024, and a board director of the AI Robot Association since 2024 , and an outside director of Panasonic Holdings Corporation since 2025

After graduating from Waseda University, Fumiaki Koizumi joined Daiwa Securities SMBC, where he managed the IPOs of tech companies including mixi, Inc. and DeNA Co., Ltd. In 2006, he joined mixi, Inc. as Director, Executive Officer, and CFO, and supervised the Corporate Division. After leaving mixi in 2012, Fumiaki supported a number of startup companies. In December 2013, he joined Mercari, Inc., where he assumed the role of Director in March 2014. He was appointed as President & COO in April 2017, and as Director, President in September 2019. He also assumed the role of CEO of Kashima Antlers F.C. Co., Ltd. in August 2019.

Junji Hatoya joined Nomura Research Institute (NRI) in 2000 and has been involved with its consulting business ever since. After working on new business development and studying abroad, he became General Manager of Financial Consulting in 2018. He was appointed to his current position in April 2023. From April 2025, he assumed the role of President of NRI APAC and was also in charge of the Consulting Division’s overseas businesses. He has led over 200 research and consulting projects primarily on themes of a financial nature, and he has also been involved in marketing, channel creation and innovation and launching new businesses primarily in the area of asset management. He has a broad range of knowhow and experience related to strategy planning, implementation and execution support.

Junji received a master’s degree in computational engineering from the Tokyo Institute of Technology and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business. He is a Director for the Japan Digital Space Economy Federation. Published works include Why Do Dramatic Changes Await the Japanese and Their Financial Behaviors? (Toyo Keizai Inc.).

Hideki Kanda is a graduate of the Faculty of Law at the University of Tokyo. After teaching as an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Law at both Gakushuin University and the University of Tokyo, he was appointed as a Professor at the Graduate Schools for Law and Politics at the University of Tokyo from May 1993. He left the University of Tokyo in March 2016 to work as a Professor at the Professional School of Law at Gakushuin University that following April until March 2024. He is currently an Emeritus Professor at the University of Tokyo. His areas of research include commerce, corporate, financial and securities law.

Shoji Miyata launched a business with a friend in 2013, and after ten failures in two years, released cloud-based human resources management platform SmartHR in 2015. In 2021, SmartHR raised 15.6 billion yen in funding from overseas investors, growing into a unicorn company. In 2022, Shoji stepped down as CEO of SmartHR and founded Nstock, Inc. to solve challenges he identified in the startup ecosystem. In 2025, he changed the company’s name to Nstock Holdings. and transitioned it to a group management structure.

After finishing graduate school at Kyoto University in 2000, Tomohisa Murakami joined Nomura Securities and was assigned to its Financial Markets Division. After working on development and structuring of interest rate and forex-related products, he was sent to the company’s London subsidiary in 2003, where he was involved with the development of equity-related products in addition to the debt syndicate business there. After returning to Japan in 2008, he handled development and sales of products across the various segments of the company’s global markets, domestic sales, and investment banking businesses. From 2014 he worked as the Managing Director of equity syndicate operations at the company’s Syndicate Department, and from 2019 his responsibilities expanded to include bonds in his new role as Department Head. He was appointed as a Senior Managing Director in April 2022, and he assumed his current position in April 2025.

Yusuke Murata joined NIF Ventures Co., Ltd. (now Daiwa Corporate Investment Co., Ltd) in 2003, where he dealt primarily with investment and fund formation management for seed startups. In 2010, he co-founded Incubate Fund where he is a General Partner. He has been the General Manager of the Japan Venture Capital Association’s (JVCA) Planning Department from 2015. Other positions he holds include Chairman of the JVCA’s Fund Ecosystem Committee and Chairman of the Association’s LP Relations Division. He was appointed as a JVCA Director in 2023.

Yuta Seki joined Nomura Research Institute after graduating from Keio University’s Faculty of Law in 1990. In 1999, he received his MBA from the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business. In 2004, he transferred to Nomura Institute of Capital Markets Research following the organization’s founding and assumed his current position there in April of 2025.

Yuta’s research has included institutional and regulatory reforms in global capital markets, securities and asset management and financial innovation with a focus on the United States. In addition to being a prolific lecturer and publisher, he is a member of the Global Research Committee of the Investment Trusts Association, Japan and a Special Advisor to the Association for Real Estate Securitization’s International Committee. He is also a lecturer at the Hosei Business School of Innovation Management.

Shinobu Ikegawa joined Sumitomo Bank (now Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation) in 1998. He was seconded to Daiwa Securities SB Capital Markets (now Daiwa Securities) from 2000 and eventually transferred there. In addition to his fourteen years of experience with IPOs at Daiwa Securities, he has also worked in the company’s Corporate Planning Department (while concurrently working in the Asia Strategies Office), Corporate Finance Department and Corporate Sales Department and so is also well-versed in financial strategies for listed companies. He has handled IPOs for Medley, Digital Grid and numerous other startups, including Japan’s first SDGs IPO (Poppins Holdings) and has been involved in such large-scale projects as Idemitsu Kosan’s global offering.

After graduating from the University of Tokyo’s Faculty of Law, Yuta Tamaru joined Paul Hastings LLP where he worked on a wide variety of corporate cases primarily related to M&A. He then went to White & Case LLP, where he handled incident response and global M&A cases involving Japanese companies. He joined Medley, Inc. in May 2016, where he oversaw the company’s IPO and transition to the TSE’s Prime Market as Director of the Corporate Division. He also took part in new business development by the company in the United States and served as an Open Innovation Partner. In October 2024, he joined Sakana AI to supervise all the company’s functions as its Corporate Operations Manager. He is a licensed attorney.

Eiji Yatagawa joined KKR in 2006 and is a Partner and Head of Japan Private Equity. He has been involved with KKR’s investments in Unisteel (Singapore), Intelligence, Panasonic Healthcare, Pioneer DJ, Transphorm (USA), Calsonic Kansei, Hitachi Koki, Hitachi Kokusai Electric, From Scratch, Seiyu, Netstars, Yayoi, Hitachi Transport System and Fujisoft. From 2010 to 2012, he worked in KKR's Hong Kong office. Prior to joining the company, he worked on Goldman Sachs & Co.'s investment banking team in New York and Tokyo, where he focused on the telecommunications, media, and technology sectors and was involved in numerous M&As and financing projects. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Tokyo’s Faculty of Engineering and a master’s degree from its School of Engineering.