Japanese companies in the UK 20 years on

After a three year gap due to the pandemic, my company has rejoined the Japanese Chamber of Commerce in the UK. My company was the first non-Japanese company, with no Japanese nationals working for it, to be allowed to become a member in 2004. This followed a change in the rules, in reaction to declining membership.

Back then, such non-Japanese companies were classified as “associate” members, and my company was allocated to the “local entrepreneurs” group. This time, we were allowed to join as a full member and we are in the “professional services” group.

Both the professional services group and the local entrepreneurs group have grown over the three years we were absent. Partly this was due to the pandemic, during which the Chamber meetings took place online, including for members of the Chamber to introduce their services through online webinars. This meant that members had the benefit of being able to promote their services and network with potential clients without having to attend Chamber meetings in London in person. Some members do not even have UK bases, because they can offer their services remotely.

Marketing to “Japanese” companies in the UK has to be much more than just being able to communicate in Japanese

The distinction between Japan originated and local companies is also blurring. Many of the traditional Japanese companies in the UK are not members of the chamber – I suspect not only because they are not based in London, but also because their senior executives are not Japanese. This localization continues, even for traditional Japanese companies based in London.

Trying to define membership by expatriate status of key managers has also become difficult. Looking at the latest Ministry of Foreign Affairs data for long term (mostly Japanese corporate expatriates) and permanent resident Japanese nationals in the UK, Germany and France, it is clear that if present trends continue, the number of permanent resident Japanese will outstrip the number of long term visa holding Japanese within the next five years in all three countries.

Local professional services companies who target Japanese companies have benefitted from this trend in that they can hire permanent resident Japanese people as employees, bringing with them Japanese language ability. However, as I have also experienced, the blurring of distinctions between Japanese and British, and increased familiarity with each other, means that marketing to “Japanese” companies in the UK has to be much more than just being able to communicate in Japanese.

This article by Pernille Rudlin originally appeared in Japanese in the Teikoku Databank News on 14th August 2024

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Japanese financial services companies in the UK and EMEA after Brexit

Japanese financial services firms in the UK have remained fairly resilient since Brexit, in terms of turnover and headcount – with significant growth shown by the non-life insurers and leasing and financing companies, but less growth for some in the banking and securities sectors. On the other hand, the UK has had significant outflows of Japanese capital, whereas Ireland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have had significant inflows.

Headcount

Judging by annual reports filed for the UK for the year 2023-2024, after several years of negative or little growth, Japanese financial services companies are starting to expand their hiring in the UK.

Adding in a guesstimate for the banks that are branches, there are over 15,000 employees in the Japan-owned UK financial services sector, and this total has grown by at least 10% over 2021/2 to 2023/4. This total represents around two-thirds of the total working for Japanese financial services firms in the region

This may indicate improving business for the Japanese financial services sector across the whole EMEA region, as many of the Japanese financial services firms in the UK act as EMEA regional headquarters. According to the JETRO Survey on Business Conditions for Japanese-Affiliated Companies Overseas (Global Edition) 2024, 92.4% of Japanese banks overseas were predicting a profit – higher than any other sector. The European edition of the survey showed that 60% of non-bank financial services companies were predicting an increased market share in Europe for 2024.

This overall growth conceals some varying fortunes, however. SMBC Bank International PLC has doubled in size since 2015, to 1,739 employees. Recent growth is partly due to the transfer of employees from SMBC Nikko Capital Markets with the merger of its securities business into SMBC. This merger process is expected to be completed by year ending March 2025. SMBC Nikko will continue as a derivatives business, conducted by employees within SMBC Bank International.

It is possible that the other two megabanks, MUFG and Mizuho have grown similarly, but as they are branches, it is not possible to verify this. Their securities arms – Mizuho International and MUFG Securities – grew by a third and by 18% respectively since 2015.

Other companies which have grown include Mitsubishi HC Capital, Tokio Marine, Aioi Nissay Dowa Insurance and Toyota Financial Services.

Headcount has dropped significantly 2021/2 to 2023/4 at Daiwa Capital Markets as part of their three year cost reduction programme. The 2024 report shows a £14m profit compared to an £18m loss in the previous year.

Nomura is showing a small recovery in employee numbers, but headcount at 1,876 is still nearly 25% down on 2015/6.

SBI Shinsei, formerly SoftBank owned Shinsei Bank, is making a comeback in London. It acquired British crypto currency company B2C2 in 2020 and its Japanese Chief Executive was approved by the UK’s FCA in 2024. The intention is to build up institutional business in equity, fixed income and digital and fintech investment.

UK financial services exports to Japan

Headcount growth may be due to increased demand from Japan for UK financial servies. UK trade statistics show that financial services exports from the UK to Japan of £2.4bn represented 30% of UK services exports to Japan in the year ending Q3 2024, an increase of 2.1% (non-seasonally adjusted) on the previous year. Financial services exports to Japan grew for the first time in 4 years in 2023.

A substantial proportion of these financial services exports may be Japanese corporate purchases of the services of UK based Japanese financial services firms, or the headquarters of those firms forwarding management fees on to their operations in the UK.

Turnover

The top 14 Japanese financial services firms in terms of turnover (turnover covering everything from gross written premiums to management fees) show that securities based businesses have had a bumpy few years, but non-life insurers and leasing and financing companies have boomed, in part because of acquisitions. Tokio Marine HCC and Endurance Worldwide’s turnovers reflect their Europe-wide business holdings.

Mergers and acquisitions, entrants and exits

As far as we are aware, there were no mergers and acquisitions in the Japanese financial services sector in the UK in 2023-4. There was one closure, of retail forex broker GMO-Z.COM, which had an operation in London since 2012, and at peak employed 17 people. One newcomer to the UK was Fuyo Lease Europe, which already had established Fuyo Aviation Capital in London. It has formed a joint venture with Sumitomo Forestry to renovate office buildings in the UK.

The new wave of global acquisitions by Japanese life insurers has not brought capital directly to the UK, however Nippon Life’s acquisition of Resolution Life will mean a much larger presence in the UK, as Resolution Life services many closed book British life insurance brands.

Capital flows

Direct investment flows from Japan, into the finance and insurance sectors, based on Japanese Ministry of Finance data,[1] show that the UK has had the largest outflow ($10bn) of Japanese investment of any country in the Europe, Middle East and Africa region from 2017 to 2023. There was a net inflow in 2023, but the balance across 2017 to 2023 is still slightly negative. (converted from JPY to USD by rate for each year)

Capital has flowed into Ireland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands since 2017 – this may be partly for favourable taxation reasons, as a reaction to the Brexit referendum but also as funds for specific financial services – for example, in Ireland’s case, for aircraft leasing. Germany and Switzerland have also seen positive flows, but France has seen a small net outflow.

Luxembourg hosts the EU headquarters for insurance companies such as Sompo and Endurance as well as various fund management companies.

Japanese banks have made some investments in British companies in 2023-24, for example Mizuho Bank invested $20 million in U.K. climate change investment and advisory firm operator Pollination Global Holdings. It is aiming to use the Pollination’s know-how to boost domestic and overseas advisory services in environmental areas and information disclosure and also to set up carbon credit projects.

Assets

Japanese banks are still small compared to other banks in Europe, in terms of total assets. The top ten biggest banks in Europe all have assets of over €1trn, whereas the biggest Japanese megabank in Europe is SMBC International, in the UK, with €51bn in assets (down from €53bn the previous year). SMBC EU AG in Germany is the second largest with €23.1bn (a 30% increase on the previous year). MUFG Bank EU has €12bn in assets and Mizuho Bank EU has €5.2bn (a 14.8% increase on the previous year).

Nomura International in the UK has total assets of €216.5bn – around the same as the assets of other Japanese financial firms in Europe combined. Nomura Financial Products GmbH has assets of €18bn, up from €14bn the previous year. They state in their most recent report that they expect assets to remain within the €15 to €20bn range over the next 24 months.

As can be seen from the chart below, total assets held in the UK have declined over the year, and mainly increased in the EU.

	2023/4	2022/3
Nomura International (UK)	€216.5bn (-9%)	€238.1bn
MUFG Securities EMEA (UK)	€74.7bn (-12%)	€85.1bn
SMBC International (UK)	€48.6bn (-5%)	€51.1bn
Mizuho International (UK)	€29.5 bn (-9%)	€32.5bn
SMBC EU AG (Germany)	€23.1bn (+30%)	€17.7bn
Nomura Financial Products GmbH (Germany)	€18.1bn (+23%)	€14.7bn
MUFG Bank (Europe) (Netherlands)	€12.1bn (-5%)	€12.8bn
Mizuho Bank Europe (Netherlands)	€5.2bn (+13%)	€4.6bn
MUFG Securities Europe	€4.2bn (+5%)	€4.0bn
Norinchukin Bank Europe (Netherlands)	€3.1bn (+24%)	€2.5bn

(GBP£1 to €1.19 US$1 to €0.97)

Daiwa Capital Markets Europe restructured its balance sheet and business model in 2023 is not included here

Localisation

There has been regulatory pressure on Japanese financial services companies in the UK to improve their corporate governance and risk management since the Lehman Shock of 2008. This has resulted in a reduction of executives being sent from Japan and more locally experienced executives being appointed as executive directors. The branches have not been under as much pressure to localise, and their senior executives are therefore largely Japanese headquarter expatriates. Most of the larger Japanese financial services firms in the UK have more than 30 Japanese expatriate employees. Many of these are at the trainee level, however.[2]

UK entities	Total board members	% non-Japanese
SMBC Bank International	10	70%
Mizuho International	9	60%
MUFG Securities EMEA	9	70%
Daiwa Capital Markets Europe	6	67%
Nomura International	8	75%

SMBC Bank International has ten board members, of whom three are Japanese directors from Japan HQ including the CEO (who has been on the board since 2018 and was appointed CEO in 2023). Alan Keir, formerly of HSBC, was chair of the board for eight years, stepping down in September 2024. He has been replaced by Sophie O’Connor. Of the 1,739 employees in London, 161 are Japanese expatriates.

The Managing Executive Officer, Head of EMEA, Deputy Head of EMEA and Head of Japanese Banking Europe at Mizuho Bank London branch are Japanese nationals from Japan headquarters. Mizuho International PLC has nine board members, of whom four are Japanese directors from Japan HQ, including the Deputy President Yoji Imafuku, appointed in 2024. The CEO Suneel Bakshi has been in post since 2019.

MUFG Bank’s Regional CEO for EMEA and the Managing Director are both Japanese nationals from Japan headquarters. MUFG Securities EMEA PLC has nine board members, three of whom are Japanese directors from Japan HQ. The CEO is Chris Kyle and the Regional Chief Executive Officer is Hidefumi Yamamura, appointed in 2024. 46 of the 291 employees at Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking are Japanese expatriates.

Maria Bentley took over as chair of the board of Daiwa Capital Markets in 2024 and slimmed the board membership to six, with four people leaving in 2023/4, including two Japanese directors from Japan headquarters. There are now two Japanese board members (both from Japan HQ – the President and a female executive director) and four non-Japanese directors, including Megan McDonald, who became CEO in 2022.

Jonathan Lewis, who had been CEO of Nomura International and Nomura Europe Holdings for ten years, has stepped down, and has become Chair for Nomura Financial Products Europe, Instinet Europe and Nomura Reinsurance (Guernsey). He has been replaced by John Tierney, who has been with Nomura for 26 years. There are now eight board members, two of whom are Japanese directors from Japan HQ, including the Vice-Chairman.

European structure

The European Central Bank and local regulators have demanded that critical decision-making and risk management take place within the EU, post Brexit. Japanese firms have responded by placing executives and substantive operations within the EU. As noted in the previous section, this has not led to any significant shrinking of presence in London and the number of employees in Japanese financial firms in the UK still far outnumber those in the European Union.

It would also seem from the disclosures and annual reports that the European Union banking firms now have to make that the past few years have been quite costly in terms of bolstering presence in the EU, and some restructuring and branch closures have taken place across the EMEA region.

All three banks are bringing their European securities operations under the wing of their European banks, to create universal banks.

The London operations of Japanese financial firms have repositioned themselves as the (non-EU) Europe, Middle East and Africa headquarters, making use of London’s financial infrastructure, expertise, and established market networks.

	Total board members	% non-Japanese
MUFG Bank (Europe) NV	4	75%
MUFG Securities Europe NV	6	83%
Mizuho Bank Europe	3	33%
Mizuho Securities Europe	3	100%
SMBC Bank EU executive board	6	67%
SMBC Bank EU supervisory board	4	50%
Norinchukin Bank management board	4	25%
Norinchukin Bank supervisory board	4	50%
Nomura Financial Products Europe	6	67%

MUFG opened MUFG Bank (Europe) NV in the Netherlands in 2016, before the Brexit referendum. The expansion since then of the functions of the regional headquarters led to increased costs, followed by a three-year plan to increase revenue, reduce costs and maintain strict internal controls and governance, resulting in the closure of branches in Barcelona, Warsaw and Prague.

The Bank’s remaining branches are in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Spain (Madrid). It employs 800 people in the Amsterdam HQ and 200 in Germany. There are four members of the management board, three of whom are European including the CEO. The Japanese expatriate director is deputy President. The Chair is also European.

MUFG operates other financial services such as leasing and fund services in Ireland and Luxembourg. MUFG Securities Europe NV, a subsidiary of MUFG Securities EMEA was established in 2018, also in Amsterdam, and has 58 employees. It has a two tier board of six people, one of whom is a Japanese expatriate, who is the CEO, appointed in 2022.

From July 2025, MUFG Securities’ global subsidiaries will be managed by MUFG Bank instead of MUFG Securities Holdings.

Mizuho Bank Europe was established in the Netherlands in 1974. It has branches in Brussels, Vienna and Madrid, employing 121 people in total. There are three members on the management board, two of whom are Japanese expatriates – the CEO and the Chief Business Officer. The other operations in Europe are branches of Mizuho Bank Japan – Frankfurt, Duesseldorf, Milan and Paris.

Mizuho Securities Europe was established in 2020 in Frankfurt, with branches in Madrid and Paris, and employs 43 people. All three members of the board are German. Work is underway to merge the EU securities business into Mizuho Bank Europe to create a universal bank, focused on Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Paris and Madrid. This will, subject to regulatory approval, mean the closure of Mizuho’s Brussels, Düsseldorf, Milan and Vienna operations.

In the UK, Mizuho Corporate Services EMEA was formed in 2023 to provide corporate function services to the region. It started operations on April 1 2024 and 900 employees were transferred to it from Mizuho International PLC and Mizuho Bank London branch.

SMBC Bank EU opened in Frankfurt in 2019 and now has 328 employees. It has branches in Amsterdam, Prague, Madrid, Dublin, Milan, Paris and Düsseldorf employing a further 104 people. SMBC Nikko Bank Luxembourg has now been brought under SMBC Bank EU’s umbrella, as part of the move to a universal bank. There are 6 members of the executive board of SMBC Bank EU, two of whom are Japanese expatriates, including the chair. The CEO is Stanislas Roger. There are four members of the supervisory board, two of whom are Japanese expatriates.

The Norinchukin Bank opened a subsidiary in the Netherlands in 2018 and now employs around 68 people. The supervisory board has four members, two of whom are Japanese expatriates, one of whom is the Chair of the board. There are also four members of the management board, three of whom are Japanese expatriates, including the Chair.

Nomura set up Nomura Financial Products Europe GmbH in 2017, which has branches in Italy, Spain, France, Sweden, Netherlands, Switzerland and Finland. It has six members on the management board, 2 of whom are Japanese expatriates – one of whom is the CEO, appointed in 2024. Other Nomura subsidiaries include Nomura Funds Ireland PLC.

Daiwa Capital Markets has operations in Frankfurt (Daiwa Capital Markets Deutschland GmbH established in 2017, CEO Fujino Yusuke, appointed 2023) and a representative office in Paris.

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance has announced in June 2024 that it will merge its MS Amlin organisation (primarily based in the UK) with MSIG Insurance Europe, headquartered in Cologne, Germany. The group management services company, MSIG Corporate Services (Europe), is based in the UK. MS Amlin Insurance SE is currently headquartered in Belgium with branches in Amstelveen, Paris and London.

Klaus M. Przybyla will be the CEO of the new company. MSIG Insurance Europe currently has four management board members, one of whom is Japanese.

MSI rebranded MS Amlin AG in Switzerland as MS Reinsurance.

Tokio Marine Europe SA is based in Luxembourg, and is a subsidiary of HCC International Insurance Company Plc in the UK. It has over 350 staff in offices across Europe.

CIS, Middle East and Africa

The search for growth has taken Japanese companies and financial services firms to higher risk markets in the CIS and EMEA, but as yet, their presence is small and there have been some closures of branches.

Thanks to Saudi Arabia’s new Regional Headquarters programme, providing all kinds of carrots and sticks for foreign multinationals to set up their Middle East regional headquarters there, we may see more Japanese activity there.

Mizuho is the only Japanese bank so far to respond to the programme, setting up a separate Middle East and Africa regional headquarters in Riyadh, in November 2024. According to Mizuho it expects further need for financing, including investment in infrastructure in the region, to move towards a net zero society and reduce oil dependence.

It has also partnered with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund to create a Tokyo-listed exchange-traded fund featuring Saudi shares.

SMFG has also recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the National Infrastructure Fund of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to support infrastructure development projects in Saudi Arabia.

All of the Japanese financial services firms continue to have operations in Russia.

Back office and corporate services

Mizuho set up Mizuho Global Services India in 2020 and intends to triple its tech and administrative staff in India to around 1,000 workers by the end of fiscal 2027, turning the country into its main hub for these operations. Nomura has had a regional services office in India for the past twenty years.

The UK continues to have strength in providing corporate services such as learning & development, marketing, logistics, law and finance and accounting, reflected in the recent establishment of Mizuho Corporate Services EMEA in the UK.

Human Resources

Nearly half of new hires in Japan at the Japanese megabanks in 2024/5 will be midcareer workers, as lenders seek specialized talent, rather than hiring new graduates who are then trained as generalists as before. Japanese banks in Europe are also hiring from the growing pool of local Japanese people, who have permanent residency in the UK.

London will continue to have a role in training up a new generation of specialists. SMFG is recruiting graduates in Japan for a fast track to work overseas in New York or London from as early as their second year. Mizuho and MUFG have similar schemes.

As part of their drive to counter the labour shortages in Japan and recruit specialists, Japan’s banks have continued to build up and celebrate their alumni networks.

2024’s headaches

MUFG Bank Japan employees stealing customer assets from safe deposit boxes
Nomura was fined for manipulating Japanese government bond futures market
A former Nomura employee was charged robbery, attempted murder and arson of a customer
Sompo Insurance CEO stepped down to take responsibility for the company’s involvement in used car dealer Bigmotor Co.’s insurance fraud scandal
Japan’s FSA penalized MUFG units for unauthorized sharing of client data
Cyberattacks (DDoS) hit both MUFG and Mizuho in Japan

Conclusions

Past history and recent trends in Japanese financial services companies in the UK reflect the continuity of London’s attraction as a global financial centre in terms of a large and specialist labour pool and infrastructure.
Despite Brexit, the number of people working for Japanese financial services companies in the UK has remained steady, with some recent growth.
Turnover in the UK continues to grow – in part driven by global acquisitions rather than acquisitions of British companies, as happened in the past.
The great majority of employees in Japanese financial services companies across Europe, Middle East and Africa are in the UK. The UK is often host to management and corporate function services for the whole region, although often administrative and IT functions are further outsourced to India.
In order to comply with EU regulatory pressures, Japanese financial services have all set up subsidiaries within the European Union, and placed both locally experienced and Japanese expatriate executives on the boards of these subsidiaries. Often these subsidiaries still report into a UK holding company, and the more senior regional executives are still based in the UK.
The picture is not so positive for the UK for the securities businesses however, or capital flows. There is a discernible shift of capital to Amsterdam for banking and securities and also to Luxembourg for fund management and Ireland for aircraft leasing.
Japanese financial services firms are also looking to invest or support their clients’ investment in infrastructure, green energy and zero carbon projects, in the UK, EU and Middle East
Turnover in securities and investment banking firms has not shown consistent growth and there has been some restructuring, consolidating and closing of smaller operations in the region.
When Japanese financial services companies have globalised through acquiring a major multinational (such as Tokyo Marine acquiring HCC, Sompo acquiring Endurance, Nomura acquiring Lehman Brothers), then they continue to have global clients and behave accordingly in terms of governance and where they deploy resources.
Japanese financial services companies, mainly banking and non-life insurance, that are still servicing a large number of Japanese corporate clients may also be looking to the European Union more, if those Japanese corporate clients have their main financial and legal bases there – as companies such as Panasonic and Sony now do. We expect further capital to flow to the EU accordingly. Another indicator of this shift is the 50% increase in the number of Japanese nationals in the Netherlands over the past ten years, although at around 10,000, this is still one-sixth of the number of Japanese people the UK hosts.

[1] Note, however, that data is often not disclosed in full in Japanese Ministry of Finance FDI reports, for confidentiality reasons.

[2] According to the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the UK 2024 directory

This is an excerpt from our 2025 report on Japanese Financial Services in the UK and EMEA, with a directory of 300 Japanese financial services companies in the region – which can be purchased and downloaded online here

Banks

Japanese banks first established operations in London in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries, to support Japan’s overseas trade and gain knowledge of modern financial and commercial practices. Japan was rapidly industrializing after the Meiji Restoration of 1868 and many of the banks worked closely with the Japanese government on their modernization programme. The banks and their sister companies, the trading companies, are a core part of what is known as the zaikai – the Japanese finance and business community which has power and influence in Japanese political circles to this day.

The Yokohama Specie Bank, founded by Japanese statesman Ōkuma Shigenobu and a group of Yokohama merchants in 1879, opened in London in 1881. After World War II, it reformed as the Bank of Tokyo and later merged with Mitsubishi Bank in 1996.

Mitsubishi Bank had also started in the 19^th century, as the currency exchange arm of the Mitsubishi trading company, and then took over the 119^th National Bank. Mitsui Bank and Sumitomo Bank were also offshoots of their respective trading companies. The three banks all had operations in London before World War II, which closed down during wartime, and reopened in the 1950s.

Fuji Bank, on the other hand, was far more domestic oriented, with no overseas branches, although it, too, grew from a trading company – Yasuda. It was the biggest bank in Japan until the Dai-ichi Bank merged with the Nippon Kangyo bank in 1971 to form the Dai-ichi Kangyo Bank (DKB).

After the bubble burst

In the 20^th century, up until the Japanese economic bubble burst in 1990, the main bank system dominated, whereby major Japanese companies stayed loyal to one of the megabanks. The megabanks were the primary lender among a hierarchy of several banks to one firm and typically held shares in the firm. Main banks would send in advisors in times of financial distress and provide corporate governance to their client firms. The main banks were Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank, Sumitomo Bank, Fuji Bank, Mitsubishi Bank, and Sanwa Bank – all of whom also had a large retail banking arm.

They were in turn part of a keiretsu – groups of companies with similar origins, holding shares in each other – the four major groups being Mitsubishi, Mitsui, Sumitomo and Fuyo (formerly Yasuda).

The Sanwa Bank was at the heart of the post war Sanwa group, which functioned as a financial, Osaka based keiretsu for companies that were not part of the four major groups. Osaka was traditionally the business, merchant capital of Japan and the historic base for the Sumitomo keiretsu. Another keiretsu, based around DKB bank included the Osaka based trading company Itochu and what is now called Sojitz. Mitsui and Mitsubishi were Tokyo based keiretsu.

After the bubble burst, and intensifying after the Asian financial crisis of 1997, a wave of restructuring and mergers hit the Japanese financial services sector. Mitsui Bank merged with Taiyo Kobe Bank in 1990 and became Sakura Bank. Then, despite coming from different keiretsu and different regions of Japan, Sumitomo Bank merged with Sakura Bank, in 2001 and became the Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation. The name in Japanese is reversed, as Mitsui Sumitomo Banking Corporation. The whole group is known as SMFG.

DKB merged with Fuji Bank and the Industrial Bank of Japan (IBJ) in 2000-2002 to form the Mizuho group. In the UK, DKB UK became Mizuho Corporate Bank and IBJ UK became Mizuho International – the securities and investment banking arm.

The Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi merged with Union Finance Japan (which in turn was the product of a merger of Sanwa Bank, Tokai Bank and Toyo Trust and Banking) in 2002 to become the MUFG group.

Given the above history, the following challenges are still being faced by the Japanese megabank groups, MUFG, SMFG and Mizuho:

Strategic clashes between a dominant domestic retail banking business and smaller overseas corporate banking, investment banking and securities businesses
Overseas customer bases are still largely composed of Japanese corporate clients
Loyalty of cohorts of executives to their original bank rather than the whole group. This should dissipate by 2040 or so, when these cohorts will have retired.
Lack of collaboration between businesses with different origins within the group such as securities, trust banking and asset management, making it difficult to put customer needs first, with one offering, as a universal bank.
Integration of legacy IT systems from different constituent banks

Branch status

Mizuho and MUFG in the UK have branch status – both being branches of the Japanese parent company. This has significant impact on their degree of autonomy, capital and decision making capability.

Norinchukin Bank, a financial institution established by Japanese agriculture, fishery and forestry cooperatives, is also a branch in the UK.

Government entities such as The Development Bank of Japan, Japan Bank for International Cooperation (a Japanese public financial institution and export credit agency) and the Bank of Japan all have branches in London. Bank of Japan also has branches in Frankfurt and Paris.

Securities and investment

Nomura is Japan’s largest investment bank and traces its roots to a money changing business in Osaka in the late 1800s, becoming Nomura Securities in 1925. Nomura opened its first office in London in 1964. It acquired Lehman Brother’s European and Middle Eastern operations in 2008.

Daiwa Securities started life in Osaka too, as Fujimoto Bill Broker in 1902. It became Daiwa Securities in 1943 and opened its first office in London in 1964. It had a joint venture with SMBC which was dissolved in 2009, and the company was renamed Daiwa Capital Markets. It acquired Close Brothers in the same year, forming Daiwa Corporate Advisory.

MUFG has a securities arm – MUFG Securities EMEA PLC in London, with a branch in Dubai. There is also MUFG Securities Europe in Amsterdam, with branch in Paris.

Mizuho International in London has a Mizuho Securities Europe GmbH subsidiary in Germany.

Trust Banks

Trust banking is far more common in Japan than in the West. The trust banks act as trustees for contracts between clients and provide banking and financing services alongside investment-related services such as asset management, pension plan design and management, real estate brokerage, and appraisal services for both corporate and individual banking clients.

The Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank is not within the SMFG group. It has been winding down its limited company in London, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust (UK) Ltd and folding personnel into its London branch. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking is within the MUFG group.

Asset Management

Most of the Japanese asset management firms set up in London in the 1980s bubble era but are now having a second lease of life, thanks to the Japanese government policy of encouraging households to shift their cash savings into investments and promoting Japan as a “Leading Asset Management Center.”

Leasing and Financing

Another asset that Japan’s high net wealth individuals have shown an appetite for is aircraft, which are then leased. A large number of Japanese aircraft leasing companies have set up in Ireland, due to its highly favourable tax regime for lease payments.

In the UK, Japanese leasing and financing businesses have been more focused on consumer markets. Mitsubishi UFJ Lease & Finance has become Mitsubishi HC Capital, following its merger with Hitachi Capital in 2021. It trades in the UK under the Novuna brand. In 2022 Mitsubishi HC Capital UK acquired the European subsidiaries of MHC Mobility, providing leasing, decarbonisation and mobility solutions across Europe.

SMBC and Mizuho also have leasing arms in Europe, as do the car companies Toyota and Honda, along with financing services.

Fuyo Lease, which has its roots in the Fuyo group companies, has two subsidiaries in the UK and Orix has also has two subsidiaries in the UK including Gravis Capital Management – as well as an aircraft leasing business in Ireland.

Fintech, cryptocurrency

Nomura has invested in a digital asset subsidiary, Laser Digital, in the UK in 2022. It specializes in trading, asset management, solutions and early-stage investing, employing 28 people.

The Japanese crypto assets exchange bitFlyer set up in Luxembourg in 2017 and was granted a Payment Institution licence in 2018.

It was announced in January 2025 that SBI Holdings has agreed to take a stake of more than 70% in German fintech company Solaris as part of a new fundraising round. SBI acquired British crypto currency company B2C2 in 2020.

Non-life Insurance Companies

Japanese non-life insurance companies also have their origins in Japan’s trading companies. Like the banks, the bursting of the Japanese economic bubble in 1990, and then the Asian financial crisis of 1997, triggered a series of restructuring.

Although word Mitsubishi does not appear anywhere on Tokio Marine’s website, it is a core Mitsubishi group company, which began direct underwriting operations in London in 1880 and established local agents there in 1890. It acquired the UK insurance company Kiln in 2008 and the Bermuda headquartered HCC Holdings in 2015.

The Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance and Aio Nissay Dowa group (MS&AD), has, like SMFG, its origins in the Sumitomo and Mitsui keiretsus, but is independent from SMFG.

MS&AD was formed in 2010 as a merger of three insurance companies – Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance, Aioi and Nissay Dowa. Aioi was the product of a 2001 merger between Dai-Tokyo Fire & Marine Insurance and The Chiyoda Fire & Marine Insurance. Nissay Dowa was formed, also in 2001, from Dowa Fire & Marine Insurance and Nissay General Insurance. MS&AD acquired British insurer Amlin in 2015/6. Aioi has had a long standing relationship with Toyota for car insurance, reinforced by the historic relationship between the Mitsui & Co trading company and Toyota.

Sompo was formed from the merger of Yasuda Fire & Marine and Nissan Fire & Marine insurance companies in 2002. Sompo then went on to acquire Nipponkoa in 2014. It acquired British insurer Canopius in 2014 and divested it in 2017. It then acquired Bermuda based insurers Endurance Specialty in 2016/7.

Life Insurance

The Mitsubishi group life insurance company is Meiji Yasuda, the product of a merger between Meiji Life and Yasuda Mutual Life in 2004. The latter was previously in the Fuyo keiretsu – which included the Marubeni trading company.

Dai-ichi Life was formerly a sister company of Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank, now part of Mizuho.

Nippon Life is the largest Japanese life insurance company by revenue and was affiliated with the Sanwa group.

All have had a relatively small presence in London but have recently been active in acquiring overseas companies – Meiji Life acquiring American Heritage Life in 2024/5, Nippon Life acquiring Bermuda based, UK origin Resolution Life in 2024/5 and Dai-ichi Life acquiring New Zealand’s Partners Life in 2022.

Reflections on the past forty years of Japanese business in the UK – what’s next? – 7

(continued from part 6)

The Japanese consumer electronics companies which were such prominent sponsors of the 1985 Japanese Miracle conference at Oxford University had all set up manufacturing in the UK in the 1970s. Sony was the first, taking over an empty factory in Bridgend, with support from the Welsh development agency. Sony denied that it had been forced to manufacture in the UK because of the upward trend in the yen, or in response protests from British manufacturers at the high level of imports coming from Japan. It pledged to use local components as far as possible, and when asked whether it would introduce Japanese paternalism to UK labour relations, Mr Okochi, the MD, responded “when in Wales do as the Welsh do”.

Panasonic (or Matsushita as it then was) also set up a factory in Wales, near Cardiff and Hitachi adopted an old GEC TV factory in Aberdare. Nissan started manufacturing in Sunderland a year after the conference, the same year Honda opened its plant in Swindon, after having had a partnership with Rover since 1979, and manufacturing under licence.

It is well documented that Honda was extremely shocked by the state of British automotive manufacturing efficiency that it saw at the Rover plant, of tea breaks, working to rule and demarcation disputes. No doubt this was why Nissan and Toyota – who set up in Derbyshire in 1989 – were determined to build an effective, well trained workforce from scratch.

Hitachi and Nissan also brought Japanese style labour relations to the UK, by adopting a one union policy – and as far as I am aware, Nissan has never had a strike in its Sunderland factory since. British workers were in turn favourable towards other Japanese management practices, such as managers eating with workers in the same canteen, and dressing in the same corporate overalls, rather than a jacket and tie.

Sony still has operations in Bridgend to this day, but more focused on B2B rather than consumer electronics, such as broadcast equipment. Panasonic still manufactures home appliances in Wales but Hitachi closed its Aberdare plant in 2001. Hitachi is also now more focused on B2B, particularly energy and rail related businesses, with a rolling stock plant in Newton Aycliffe.

(For more on this period, see our post Hitachi in the UK from TV to Trains)

Hitachi in the UK – from TVs to trains (part 1)

Hitachi’s first foray into manufacturing the UK in the 1970s was extremely fraught. Undeterred, 10 years later, it established its European headquarters in the UK, where it has been located since. It has kept faith with the UK through turbulent times, establishing the global headquarters for its rail business in the UK in 2014.

Hitachi had a sales arm in the UK since 1970, marketing “portable monochrome television receivers, radios and record-players”. This was heralded in The Times as “another challenge on the home market from a Japanese rival” (1) noting that this was the third Japanese group to enter the UK home market in recent months (the other two being Sony and Matsushita).

The enemy within the walls

As with much of Japanese manufacturing investment overseas at the time, setting up production within the European Community (EC) was done to avoid accusations of dumping, and to ensure there was enough local content to satisfy the European Commission. Hitachi initially considered a greenfield site in Washington in the North East of England for manufacturing TVs in 1975, shortly after Sony and Matsushita had established manufacturing in the UK. This attracted such hostility from UK domestic competitors worried about overcapacity that Hitachi shelved the idea.

Hitachi was hoping to source cathode ray tubes from British firm Mullard, the only UK manufacturer of colour TV tubes, who were initially very reluctant. They maintained in 1977 that they were not ready to accept a Hitachi offer to buy 25,000 of its tubes a year from 1980. Jack Akerman, Mullard’s managing director, sounded positively sniffy about Hitachi’s technology. “We must be absolutely satisfied that our merchandise is going to be used in a technical environment where it will perform well and live well. If all the technical points are answered and we are satisfied, then it would be acceptable for Mullard and Hitachi to trade together in the event that Hitachi’s new factory were welcomed to this country by the Government.”(2)

The Times ran an opinion piece by the commercial editor Derek Harris asking if Hitachi was going to become “the enemy within the walls”. (3) It detailed a rumour that Finnish made TV tubes (from a partly Hitachi owned company) might supply Hitachi in the UK instead, in return for British fighter aircraft exports to Finland, in an offset deal between governments. It described how Mullard’s real concern was not technological compatibility so much that the British TV industry had substantial overcapacity, so Mullard supplying Hitachi would simply result in damage to existing UK customers of Mullard such as Rank, Thorn and Mullard’s sister company Pye (both were owned by the Dutch company Philips).

Harris quotes Akerman as saying “those first few years will be as smooth as silk. But then – watch out. In Japan they are planning for the year 2000, They want to dominate the electronic equipment business and, as we have said consistently, we don’t blame them.”

“Critically endangered” by tube imports from Japan

Derek Harris wrote a further piece in The Times in October 1978 (4) noting the warning from the European Electronic Component Manufacturers’ Association that the European electronics industry was being critically endangered by cheap imports from Japanese TV component makers. The tubes represented a third of the value of a TV set, and out of every 100 colour sets sold in the EEC, 33 contained tubes made in Japan. This was to intensify in the early 1980s when licensing agreements expired, opening the EEC to the larger colour TV sets made in Japan. UK TV manufacturers had an informal agreement with the Japanese industry on import restraint, but nonetheless, it was estimated that Britain’s TV and audio industry was operating at only 50% capacity.

The UK government then introduced Hitachi to the General Electric Company (the UK company that eventually became Marconi, not the US company General Electric) and the two companies formed a joint venture, GEC-Hitachi Television Ltd, in December 1978 and adopted an existing GEC television factory in Aberdare, Wales, along with a workforce of over 2,000.

Hitachi takes over GEC factory

The British continued to manage the plant, and Hitachi invested nearly £3m in new plant and equipment, and provided technical support. At first sales were good, building up a 10% UK market share. By the early 1980s, overmanning and industrial strife led to losses. GEC sold its half of the company to Hitachi in March 1984 and it became Hitachi Consumer Products Ltd. Hitachi instituted a one union policy and reduced the workforce to 800. The plant also began to manufacture hi-fi equipment. Mullard was a supplier to Hitachi, along with Tabuchi Electric who had set up production in the UK in 1985. Philips changed the Mullard name to Philips Components in 1988.

Hitachi also started a video cassette recorder plant in Germany and eventually the German plant also manufactured TVs and the Wales plant also manufacturered VCRs, with German made cylinder heads and chassis being shipped to the UK and British made PCBs being exported to Germany. This meant the local content for both TVs and VCRs were around 80-90%.(5)

The bubble bursts

In the 1990s competition from cheaper TVs and VCRs made in developing countries made it difficult for Hitachi and other UK based Japanese manufacturers to compete. The Aberdare plant was closed in 2001, with the loss of 700 jobs. Hitachi said it would focus on higher value added products in Europe such as plasma screens, projectors for home cinema, DVD camcorders and in-car navigation systems. After several years of losses, Hitachi Consumer Products UK Ltd was wound up in 1995-1997 and the business transferred to Hitachi Home Electronics, until it too was liquidated in 2003, with remaining assets and business transferred to Hitachi Europe.

(1) The Times, 21 August 1970, p 20

(2) The Times, 10 November 1977, p 20

(3) The Times, 18 November 1977, p 21

(4) The Times, 4 October 1978, p 22

(5) Much of this post is based on pages 304-9 of Japanese Manufacturing Investment in Europe, Its impact on the UK Economy, Roger Strange, Routledge 1993

Takiron – first Japanese company in Wales

Takiron was one of the first Japanese manufacturers to set up in the UK, in 1972. It was the first Japanese company to come to Wales and the third to start production in the UK, in 1974, after YKK and Nittan. It manufactured PVC corrugated sheeting after acquiring an existing factory in Bedwas, Gwent, mostly for export to Europe and America.

The Times in 1972 saw this investment as Japanese chemical and trading companies (Itochu and Chugai Boeki were also investors) “launching a big attack” on the European PVC sheet market through a UK subsidiary. (1) Just before it started operations, a spokesman for Takiron said they had been able to hire British workers at 10%-30% lower rates than they would in Japan, thanks to the current exchange rate, so even with the high cost of raw materials in the UK, it would be possible to export to Europe and America at a competitive price. The president of Takiron at the time, Matsui Yanosuke, even thought exports to Japan from the UK would be a possibility. (2)

One of the first employees was also one of the first Japanese people to be “locally hired” in the UK by a Japanese company – Midori Matsui. She had been visiting the UK on a break from teaching English at junior high school in Japan when a childhood friend at Takiron called her to offer her a job at the new company, teaching English to the new expatriates and helping them to set up the business.

She ended up staying at Takiron for 29 years, becoming a director of the company, until retiring in 2000. According to an interview with her in the Japan Times in 2001, she was thinking of returning to Japan, but was expecting to keep visiting Wales, as she said she would miss the warmth of the Welsh people, and the green fields and open skies. Clearly their appeal was too strong, and she continued to live in Wales, until her death in 2016 at the age of 80. She helped to organise the Japan 2001 celebrations and other local Japan related activities, and was awarded an MBE and a Japanese Foreign Minister’s commendation.

Although she says in the interview that the British lack of commitment to deadlines and work was “different now”, it’s a comment still heard regularly from Japanese working in the UK. But so is her point that the British are forgiving of mistakes and differences, unlike in Japan.

Former Wales rugby player Ken Jones was managing director and then chairman in the 1980s and 1990s. When the pound began to strengthen so that by January 1980 it was around Y550 compared to Y350 in 1979, and the UK went into recession, Jones was upbeat in a Daily Mirror interview: “we have invested £120,000 in new machinery” and added that the staff identified themselves closely with the company – “there’s a high degree of participation here. ” (3)

By 1991 Takiron UK employed 68 people (3) but from the mid 1990s it began to lose money and had shrunk to 57 employees by 2001. Takiron blamed the strong pound and continued high price of raw materials for its difficulties and decided to close in 2001.

The plant was supposed to be taken over by a manufacturer of roller doors in 2006 but was still empty in 2007, when it was taken over for the “biggest rave in South Wales.”

Takiron started as Takigawa in 1919, changing its name to Takiron in 1959. It is owned by the Japanese trading house Itochu and in 2017 it merged with C.I. Kasei (itself a merger between Hama Kasei and Kobe Resin) to form C.I. Takiron. C.I. Kasei had invested 32m euros in setting up a factory in Treviso, Italy in 2007, under the name of Bonlex Europe. The local vocational school was one of the key factors for choosing the location, providing courses in woodworking and automotive, relevant to the plastic films to decorate wood panels and car interiors that the factory produces.

Bonlex is the only subsidiary C.I. Takiron now has in Europe.

(1) The Times, October 4 1972 p 20

(2) The Times, June 7 1973 p 25

(3) The Daily Mirror, 27 November 1980 p 6

(3) Japanese Manufacturing Investment in Europe: Its impact on the UK economy, Roger Strange, Routledge, 1993

Mitsubishi Electric in the UK – 1979 to present

In January 1979 Mitsubishi Electric UK took over a colour TV plant in Haddington, East Lothian from bankrupt Norwegian company Tandberg, saving 120 jobs. Exports of colour TVs from Japan to the EU and particularly the UK had risen rapidly in the early 1970s, even though they were restricted to small screen sets. Then demand in the UK came to a sudden end and TV manufacturing in the UK had excess capacity. So the British government encouraged Japanese companies to take over existing plants. Japanese companies also chose the UK for manufacturing in Europe because there were no domestic manufacturers with government connections as there were in France (Thomson-Brandt) and the Netherlands (Philips). (1)

Mitsubishi Electric already had a representative office in London from 1969 and had turned it into subsidiary in 1972. This then became a branch of Mitsubishi Electric BV in the Netherlands in 1996. It has continued as a branch of the Netherlands based European regional HQ since.

By 1987 Mitsubishi Electric had established video recorder production facilities in Livingston, along with many other Japanese manufacturers starting production in Europe, in response to pressure and anti dumping proceedings from the European Commission. (2)

It acquired Britain’s Apricot Computers in April 1990, with a plant in Glenrothes and R&D in Birmingham, employing 442 in 1991. PC production was scheduled to treble to 100,000 per annum in 1993, with exports accounting for 25% of production, half to Japan. (3) Glenrothes was shut in 1999, blaming cheap competition in Asia.

The Haddington plant continued to make colour TVs and also microwave ovens, but when the price of TVs dropped, it was no longer profitable. In 1998 production ended, with 500 jobs lost. Production was transferred to Turkey.

Alister Jack, the then Scottish Tory spokesman on economic affairs, who later became Secretary of State for Scotland, attacked the Labour government on the closure: “There is little point of introducing a New Deal programme if they cannot hold on to existing jobs.”

Mitsubishi Electric hoped to focus on video recorder production and air conditioning at their Livingston plants. However, in 1999 it announced it would cut 6.100 jobs overseas and 8,400 jobs in Japan due to losses caused by falling semi-conductor prices and weak demand for consumer products.

The Livingston operation entirely focused on air conditioning and R&D for Europe moved there in 2013, with Mitsubishi Electric investing £20 million into the operation.

In 2017 air conditioner production started at Mitsubishi Electric’s new factory in Turkey. Thanks to the customs union with the EU, air conditioning exports from Turkey to the EU are tariff free.

Mitsubishi Electric Air Conditioning UK employed over 1000 people In 2019. 77% of its sales of £200m were to non-UK EU countries, 20% to the UK. The plant was profitable despite a large increase in gas and transportation costs.

The UK is seen as a growing market, despite any Brexit impact, because of the need for green, affordable public sector housing. Mitsubishi Electric is dependent on imported components, but it is standard industry practice to hold 2.5 months of inventory, so it is hoping to weather any post Brexit logistics impact.

(1) Japanese Manufacturing Investment in Europe: Its impact on the UK economy” Roger Strange, Routledge, 1993 p 196

(2) ibid p 201

(2) ibid p 264

Photograph of Campbell Gill ~ Personnel Manager and Eric Murray the General Manager with the joint Managing Director Yoshio Noguchi 1984, credit: Angus N Bathgate https://www.facebook.com/groups/oldeastlothain/permalink/2402751853280700

Japan and the legacy of Margaret Thatcher

I suspect it is hard for people in Japan to understand why Margaret Thatcher’s death has aroused such strong feelings of hatred and adulation amongst British people, even 23 years after she ceased to be prime minister.

My generation (people born in the 1960s) is sometimes labelled “Thatcher’s children” – because we grew up under her. We remember 1971, when she was education minister and abolished free school milk for seven to eleven year old school children. Actually many children, myself included, really disliked the free school milk, which was lukewarm and smelly by the time we were given it to drink at morning break each day.

We had already moved to Japan by the time I was seven. I did not escape, however, as we had to drink milk at my Japanese school too, which was even worse tasting, in my opinion, because it was homogenised rather than pasteurised.

People thought we were crazy to move to somewhere as foreign as Japan, but England in 1972 did not feel like a comfortable place to be either – there had been miners’ and dockers’ strikes, followed by declarations of a state of emergency. Wage and price freezes had been announced and unemployment went over 1 million for the first time since the 1930s.

There were economic problems in Japan too – I remember the toilet paper panic buying because of the oil crisis – but as is now well known, the crisis was the trigger for Japan to start innovating in car manufacturing. Just before we left the UK, Honda had started importing cars to the UK, and when we returned to the UK in 1977, we decided to buy a Datsun Sunny 120Y.

My grandparents were horrified. They still had strong memories of the war and had opposed us moving to Japan. They could not understand why we did not buy a British car, like the Triumph Dolomite they owned. It was manufactured by British Leyland, which was then being crippled by a series of strikes.

Margaret Thatcher was extremely patriotic too – but she was happy to welcome any foreign investor who shared her ethic of hard work. While my generation was busy hating her for destroying mining communities, cutting education spending and warmongering, her government encouraged Nissan to open its first factory, in Sunderland, an area in desperate need of jobs thanks to the closure of mines and shipyards.

Thirty years later, there are no British owned volume car producers, but nearly 1.5 million vehicles were produced in the UK last year, closing in on the 2 million peak of 1970, and 86% of production is exported. Only 195,000 people are directly employed by the car industry, however, compared to 850,000 in 1970. The North of England remains a high unemployment, depressed region. This explains the depth of feelings about Mrs Thatcher’s legacy – she was right, from a business perspective, but there was a human cost which was not addressed.

This article by Pernille Rudlin originally appeared in Japanese in the May 15th 2013 edition of the Teikoku Databank News and also appears in Pernille Rudlin’s book “Shinrai: Japanese Corporate Integrity in a Disintegrating Europe” – available as a paperback and Kindle ebook on Amazon.

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Last updated by Pernille Rudlin at 2025-03-06.

History of Japanese companies in UK

Category: History of Japanese companies in UK