Keynote Address-2 Hiroshi Mikitani : Growth and Strategy of Rakuten

Date

September 7 (Tue.) 14:00-15:00

Room

Hall-A (International Conference Hall 3F)

Speaker

Hiroshi Mikitani
(Rakuten, Inc.)

Speaker’s profile

Hiroshi Mikitani is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Rakuten, Inc., an internet conglomerate providing numerous services worldwide. Over 6,000 employees belong to the Rakuten Group. Group sales reached US$3.2 billion in fiscal 2009. Rakuten’s core business“Rakuten Ichiba”is Japan’s largest Internet shopping mall, with over 64 million registered members, offers more than 58 million products by over 33,000 merchants, some of whom have monthly turnover of more than US$1 million. Mikitani earned his undergraduate degree in commerce from Hitotsubashi University in 1988. After graduation, he joined the Industrial Bank of Japan, Limited, now Mizuho Corporate Bank, and became an investment banker. While working at IBJ, Mikitani attended Harvard Business School and earned his MBA in 1993. Two years later, he left the bank. In 1996, Mikitani founded Crimson Group, a consulting company, and became its President and CEO. In February of the following year, he founded MDM, Inc. (now Rakuten, Inc.) and became its President and CEO. With only a handful of staff, Mikitani successfully launched the Rakuten Shopping Mall in May the same year. In June 1999, MDM, Inc. changed its name to Rakuten, Inc.Rakuten, Inc. completed its IPO and was listed on the JASDAQ market in April 2000. With its IPO proceeds, Rakuten began its aggressive expansion strategy with its first major acquisition, an Internet portal company, Infoseek in December 2000. Over the next decade, Rakuten has continued making strategic acquisitions and expanding its eco-system greatly. Major acquisitions include businesses in travel, securities, credit card and Internet banking. Complementing its core business, Rakuten Ichiba, the company has added over 30 Internet businesses. From 2008, Rakuten set out to expand its business overseas. Rakuten will continue its global expansion and its mid-to-long term strategy will be to expand its business into over 20 countries.

Presentation title

Growth and Strategy of Rakuten