{"id":4,"date":"2010-11-08T20:32:46","date_gmt":"2010-11-08T11:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.assentia-hd.com\/en\/"},"modified":"2020-02-05T12:14:22","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T03:14:22","slug":"company","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.assentia-hd.com\/en\/company\/","title":{"rendered":"Company"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Contribute to sound franchise businesses”<\/span><\/p>\n

I founded the company with this mission statement.<\/p>\n

Looking back, since 1991 I have been engaged in various forms of franchise businesses, and restaurant businesses. In 2006, I had an opportunity to join diverse franchise headquarters in the United States, the home of franchise business, and learn from them. \u00a0As a result of this experience, I have come to think about the current Japanese franchise situation and how it should be in the future from various aspects.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I have experienced a wide range of positions in the past, as a franchisee, and in franchise headquarters, and acquired the knowledge of the US franchise business scheme and the food and restaurant industry as a whole. \u00a0Now, with these experiences, I am committed to repaying my gratitude toward the franchise industry and the food and restaurant industry for making me what I am now.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Our background<\/u><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In 1991, we started the business that was not yet found in Japan, or even in the world.<\/p>\n

That business was to become an agency who provides franchise store-development service. We came up with the idea to persuade companies to join a franchise as their new business; our target was not individuals, but the small and medium-sized enterprises who already established with their businesses.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It was started by Director Nobuhiko Matsumoto as a business division of one company, and it was named \u201cbusiness brokerage service\u201d.<\/p>\n

Soon after this department was started, Akira Tsuchiya joined the team, and we developed the business together.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Our first client was St. Marc Caf\u00e9.<\/p>\n

St. Marc Caf\u00e9 has its headquarters in Okayama, a provincial city in Japan, and back then, it was a small chain that had only 2 directly-managed stores and 2 franchise-member stores.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This franchise business was to open a 3500sqft store on 20,000sqft land with 2 million USD initial investment cost (excluding the cost for land acquisition).<\/p>\n

We successfully expanded their business into over 150 stores within 4 years, and the St. Marc Caf\u00e9 became a public-listed company in 1995.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

With that as a start, we managed to expand over 30 franchise brands including various restaurant brands i.e. BBQ \u201cGyukaku\u201d, steak \u201cFrance-Tei\u201d, katsudon \u201cKatsuya\u201d, sushi delivery \u201cGin-no Sara\u201d, and from other hospitality business categories i.e. second-hand automobile dealer \u201cGuliver\u201d, second-hand golf club dealer \u201cGolf Partner\u201d, children\u2019s learning school \u201c7 habits\u201d (partnered with American company, Franklin Covey), women\u2019s fitness club \u201cCurves\u201d (as a master franchiser of the American brand), by selling new businesses to small to medium-sized enterprises in Japan.<\/p>\n

Number of the stores we successfully opened are over 8000.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

During this time, in 1996, not only carrying out the franchise store development work for brands, we have established a company, Prime Link Ltd., to start a business that we become franchisee ourselves to grow the business.<\/p>\n

Especially with \u201cGyukaku\u201d, we became a master franchiser of the west of Japan area, and as a part of the franchise headquarter, we had achieved to grow it into 380 franchise member stores.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In 2001, Prime Link became the very first franchise business company that is listed on the stock market.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We are able:<\/p>\n