On assuming the position of chairperson of the Board of Directors

Since May 2023, I have served as an outside director, and then since May 2025 as chairperson of the Board of Directors. In 2024, I joined the Strategy Committee, composed of outside directors, and made recommendations regarding the Group’s growth strategy and improvement of capital efficiency. Furthermore, at the Special Committee, which also includes outside experts in finance and international legal affairs, we have held more than 40 discussions over the past year on takeover bids from foreign companies and 7-Eleven’s medium- to long-term, essential corporate value.
In May 2025, the Company made a fresh start as an entity specializing in the CVS business under a new management team led by CEO Stephen Hayes Dacus, who previously served as chair of the Strategy Committee and chairperson of the Board of Directors. Through our discussions thus far, I have been reminded of 7-Eleven’s strengths and global potential. On the other hand, business performance continues to be challenging, and we feel the need to address this issue with a sense of urgency. As an outside director and chairperson of the Board of Directors, I will oversee the Company’s steady growth trajectory and enhancement of corporate value in line with its roadmap toward 2030 and beyond, while sincerely listening to the voices of shareholders and other stakeholders. I strongly recognize that this is my greatest mission and I intend to fulfill these responsibilities.

Understanding of the current situation

Turning our attention to the external environment, in addition to prolonged global inflation and supply chain uncertainties, Japan continues to suffer from structural headwinds such as labor shortages. A sense of urgency has also developed within the Group about a declining brand image and a lack of proposal capabilities, and markets are also assessing us quite harshly. Now that the Group structure has undergone major changes, I believe it is necessary to make renewed efforts to transform the corporate culture and climate to reach an ideal state.
On the other hand, the Group possesses an unparalleled global retail platform with approximately 60 million customers a day, primarily in Japan and the United States. If we can reaccelerate field-oriented value creation and further stimulate use of digital technologies and data, I believe there is significant room for renewed growth. Based on this understanding of the current situation, the Board of Directors has narrowed down its agenda to four important issues for discussion.

Important issues for the Board of Directors in FY2025

First, in light of the current situation in which the Group has pivoted from having diverse business categories, mainly in Japan, to a new business format specializing in the global CVS business, I believe that our first priority is to redefine the roles of the holding company and each operating company and to strengthen the necessary functions and the human resources to carry them out.
The second point is how to establish a governance system as we expand our business globally. It will be important to accelerate decision-making and actions by transferring authority to operating companies, while redesigning internal control mechanisms, including risk management, such as cybersecurity and BCP. To achieve this, supervision will be necessary such that the Company demonstrates its capabilities as a Center of Excellence, leveraging our global scale and knowledge (best practices) by updating our business management and operating framework.
Third, we will monitor the status of execution of the initiatives for growth and structural reforms described in the “Transformation of 7-Eleven” released in August 2025 under the new system. This monitoring will be to see whether these initiatives and reforms are being steadily carried out and whether trajectories are being promptly corrected in response to changes in the business environment. In doing so, we intend to accurately assess the situation, and, while not falling into the trap of micromanagement, maintain an appropriate distance between execution and supervision, exercising the supervisory function of the Board of Directors through constructive dialogue.
Finally, I strongly feel the need to deepen the discussion on human capital, which is becoming more and more important, and on the corporate culture and awareness reforms that form the foundation of human capital. We should reflect on whether the concepts of “trust and sincerity,” “responding to change while strengthening fundamentals,” and “thinking from the customer’s perspective” that we have espoused are instilled in our daily activities. At the same time, we need to define new values that we should share as a global retail group in a business environment that is undergoing dramatic change.

Operation of the Board of Directors

Enhancing corporate value

The Board of Directors plays several important roles: through strategic discussions, monitoring of measures, and KPI progress management, we ensure steady progress toward the growth strategies and structural reforms for 2030 that we have presented to shareholders and investors; and we visualize and share with stakeholders the status of capital efficiency and shareholder returns.
Overseeing the formulation of strategies and the progress of measures is a fundamental task for us outside directors, and we will place more emphasis on the speed of this process in the future. The key to revitalizing the retail front lines is to make precise course corrections while implementing the PDCA cycle at high speed in response to daily customer movements, and speeding up this process is crucial to increasing the accuracy of measures. From a corporate management perspective, setting targets for 2030 is not such a far-off view, and the Group is keenly aware of the need to further increase the speed of management.
We have received a variety of feedback from our stakeholders regarding the “Transformation of 7-Eleven” released by the Company. These include not only expectations for growth, but also suggestions and questions regarding room for further improvement. Going forward, we will continue to listen sincerely to our shareholders, investors, and other stakeholders and strive to enhance management transparency and efficiency and improve corporate value through constructive dialogue.

Discussion on what makes an ideal leader

Since May 2022, when the Company achieved a majority of outside directors, there has been significant internal and external interest in the Group’s bold structural reforms and discussions at our Nomination Committee, where we select new directors and the next CEO. The role of outside directors on the committee is to provide constructive recommendations from an objective perspective to ensure the sustainable growth and sound governance of the Company. Expectations on this role of ours have increased year by year, and since assuming the position of outside director, I have constantly felt that the importance of this role has been growing. Especially in the two years since 2023, when I was appointed as chair of the Nomination Committee, discussions have been more and more energized about the new Group structure and measures for business transformation, and we have been tasked with accelerating the selection of future director candidates. In this context, the committee has endeavored to actively exchange views on what qualities and abilities are required of a CEO to lead a new growth strategy, what knowledge and skills directors must possess, and the ideal leaders and governance structure for a global CVS company from Japan.

Top management should be capable of both dialogue and execution

At the core of our vision for the next CEO is to have experience in managing distribution and retail businesses in global markets, a sincere attitude toward diverse stakeholders, and the capability to execute strategies and deliver results. Effective stakeholder communication is essential for strategy execution. I believe that, instead of a charismatic leader who will use that quality to strongly influence the organization and drive management, it is essential that top management at global companies going forward should possess capabilities for dialogue and execution. With these, they can steadily carry out strategies based on dialogue with stakeholders.
Accordingly, newly appointed CEO Stephen Hayes Dacus possesses both of these qualities. He is a hands-on practitioner of management who has demonstrated leadership in retail as well as food products and food service companies in Japan and the United States, and as a bilingual person, he can also serve as a global bridge. In particular, I expect that his attitude of emphasizing speed in transformation and being a “servant” leader, rather than a “top-down approach,” who gives top priority to the growth of subordinates and the organization, will be a major driving force in achieving the Group’s growth.

Discussion on CxO succession plan

At the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting in 2025, four new outside directors were appointed alongside the CEO change. All of them have the knowledge and experience essential for the Company’s global growth, further increasing the diversity of the Board of Directors. On that basis, our next task, as we look to make the Group a truly global CVS organization, is to expand the depth of our management team, including chief officers (CxOs), and strengthen its functions. Currently, the Board of Directors is in the process of redefining the ideal state of the holding company, and in parallel, we will discuss the CxO succession plan that will be required going forward.
In addition, I am currently involved as an observer in the development of senior management candidates, including through women’s empowerment and DX, and I would like to actively provide input on the development of next-generation human resources to help the Company reach a state of global talent management, where there is strategic cross-border utilization of talent.
As for the Nomination Committee, we will continue to work with the Board of Directors to improve the quality of the nomination process and help to build a virtuous cycle of recruitment, development, and promotion.

Compensation practices: Fueling global growth and shareholder value

Since joining the Board of Directors as an independent director in 2022, a significant portion of our time was necessarily focused on structural reforms and managing acquisition proposals. While these strategic discussions were crucial for our future vision, they occasionally diverted focus from developing proactive growth strategies.
Under the leadership of our new CEO, Mr. Stephen Dacus, we are actively charting the course for the global CVS group, specifically defining the ideal structure and role of the holding company and its growth trajectory. Within this critical context, my mission is unequivocal: to establish compensation practices that are perfectly aligned with this new structure and reliably contribute to enhancing shareholder value.

A new focus: Value creation and human capital strategy

I believe a robust compensation framework is the starting point of our value creation process. It must be a system that attracts and motivates key talent across the organization—from executives with global management skills and next-generation leadership candidates to employees driving store operations worldwide. Everyone must find their compensation attractive, take pride in their work, continuously challenge themselves, and see their results directly contribute to sustained profits.

Promoting a new, global compensation framework

To achieve this, we must first correctly understand the compensation approaches and operational best practices in the United States. Our global expansion, particularly our high-growth North American operations, is a very critical engine driving our future.
I bring a unique, bilateral perspective to this challenge. Having served as a CEO at U.S. financial institutions and major consulting firms, and as President of a foreign-affiliated IT company in Japan, I have a deep understanding of compensation committee approaches and evaluation processes in both countries. I currently leverage this expertise not only here but also as an outside director and Compensation Committee Chair at SEI in the U.S., establishing a framework for two-way strategic alignment.

Bridging the divide for global competitiveness

While the simple adoption of the U.S. model is impractical—given variations in local cost of living, productivity, and industrial structures—we must address current limitations. In Japan, deeply entrenched practices like seniority-based promotion and ambiguous job definitions complicate a necessary shift toward a performance-based compensation framework.
Nevertheless, as chair of the Compensation Committee for a company in global competition, I have a responsibility to persistently push for this transition. A rigid system that fails to attract global talent or inhibit personnel mobility will undeniably hinder our growth. With this urgency and mission, the Compensation Committee and the Board are currently defining compensation practices appropriate for a truly global CVS enterprise.

My role as a U.S.–Japan bridge

Born and raised in Japan, I graduated from a U.S. university and subsequently honed essential skills—communication, negotiation, active listening, and empathy—across different languages, cultures, and values. It is my life’s work to serve as a bridge connecting these two nations as we globally expand 7-Eleven, a company born in the U.S. and grown in Japan.
I will fulfill my role to establish compensation practices that nurture people, reward challenges, and achieve sustainable growth in shareholder value, ensuring 7-Eleven remains a corporate brand respected by business professionals worldwide.