Masaaki Kanai
President and Representative Director, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.

1976
Joined Seiyu Store Nagano Co., Ltd. (presently, The Seiyu GK.)
1993
Joined Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.
1997
General Manager of Household Division, Merchandising Division, Muji Business Headquarters, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.
2000 Director; General Manager of Household Division, Sales Headquarters, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.
2001
Managing Director; General Manager of Sales Headquarters, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.
2003
Representative Director and Senior Managing Director, and Executive Officer; General Manager of Merchandising Headquarters; in charge of Advertising and Promotions Office, Sales Headquarters, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.
2008
President and Representative Director, and Executive Officer, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd.(Present Position)

Born in 1957. Entered Ryohin Keikaku in 1993 after working for Seiyu Stores, presently Seiyu GK. Contributed to the growth of Ryohin Keikaku by driving the Household division, which is a main pillar of its sales, as General Manager of Household division in Merchandising for long time. Later assigned as Managing Director; General Manager of Sales Headquarters, Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd and undertook structural reforms of the company with Mr. Matsui, current chairman. Assigned as President and Representative Director in February 2008 and remained up to the present. Since his career at Seiyu, he has been involved in “MUJI” in the fields of Sales and Merchandising. Since August 2006, assigned as Chairman of IDEE Co., Ltd. and later assigned as President and Representative Director of IDEE in September 2009. Is working on improving the corporate value of whole Ryohin Keikaku group companies.

Mr. Hartmut Esslinger

"Featured on the cover of Business Week in December 1990 with the caption, “How Hartmut Esslinger is shaking up the world of industrial design,” Hartmut Esslinger is one of the best known and respected designers in the world. In 1969, Esslinger founded frog design in his native Germany and sparked a design revolution through his unique emotional and cultural style. His work has defined the modern consumer aesthetic with such revolutionary products as Sony's original Trinitron television, the Apple Macintosh, and Lufthansa’s brand and fleet image. In 1994, Esslinger's frog brought its product design prowess to the virtual world and has developed digital works for clients including Adidas, Microsoft, and SAP. Other world-class clients include Acer, Acura/Honda, AT&T and its Labs, CitiCorp, Discovery Channel, Disney, IBM, Kaltenbach & Voigt, Karstadt, Kodak, Louis Vuitton, Motorola, NEC, Packard Bell, Rosenthal, Siemens, Sun Microsystems, Swatch, Virgin Records, Yamaha and Zeiss— to name only a few.

Hartmut Esslinger is also Founding Professor of the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe, Germany, has an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from the Parson School of Design, University of New York, and is an Honorary Member of the Design Academy of Mexico. In 1992 Hartmut Esslinger received the Raymond Loewy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Concurrent to the award was the release of the book “Hartmut Esslinger and frogdesign” (Steidl Verlag, Goettingen, 1992) and an exhibit about frog at the Museum of Arts and Crafts in Hamburg, Germany. Esslinger's work has been lauded internationally and is part of the design collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York (NY MoMA), the Smithsonian Institute, and Neue Sammlung, Munich."