What is timeless for Mitsui is our corporate culture and spirit of Challenge and Innovation and open-mindedness. This is the very foundation of Mitsui’s basic philosophy: proposing real solutions to a wide range of societal challenges around the world, executing them ourselves, and enhancing corporate value through the accumulation of these efforts. Going forward, I intend to continue with this exact approach.
Mitsui operates businesses across a broad range of business fields while understanding the diverse characteristics of each geographical region. Our true strength lies in the real solutions we create by combining knowledge and capabilities across business and regional boundaries, and this is highly valued by our customers. Going forward, I would like to further evolve this strength.
The prerequisite for this is the low barriers within our organization. I communicate directly with the leaders of our 15 business units on a daily basis, make sure we are in alignment, and make decisions quickly. In addition, what is important is that the management leadership team not only oversees its areas of responsibility but also plays a company-wide role by engaging in discussions on project formation and business strategy beyond the boundaries of business units and regions. These discussions are conducted not only from the perspective of the organization that originated the project, but also from the standpoint of pursuing the optimal solution for Mitsui as a whole. Another feature of ours is a corporate culture in which management exchanges views candidly and openly. This management structure with low barriers encourages collaboration across businesses and regions and supports the demonstration of our comprehensive strength.
This organizational and management structure has developed naturally as Mitsui has met customers’ expectations for proposals unconstrained by business fields or industry boundaries. I believe this is the result of always meeting customer expectations and pursuing solutions to issues that lie ahead of them. Going forward, by combining this strength with AI, we will maximize its potential, establish a virtuous cycle of enhancing corporate value and solving societal challenges, and aim to remain a trusted presence for stakeholders.

In MTMP2026, I believe a major achievement was that we realized a high level of both investments for growth and shareholder returns, thereby building a foundation for the next stage of growth. Investments for growth expanded to approximately 2.4 trillion yen, roughly double the initial plan, while shareholder returns totaled approximately 1.6 trillion yen, with shareholder returns as a percentage of COCF exceeding 53%, significantly above the initial plan.
In particular, I believe it was an extremely important achievement for building a stable future earnings base that we were able to execute investments in longterm, robust projects in segments such as Mineral & Metal Resources, Energy, and Chemicals, which will begin contributing to earnings from 2030 onward. At the same time, investments executed under MTMP2026 are expected to generate further earnings during the MTMP2029 period. In addition, many new investments for growth for MTMP2029, which will contribute to earnings immediately, are also in the pipeline. By steadily executing these projects, strengthening our current earnings capability, and then adding earnings for large-scale projects from 2030 onward, we aim to draw a seamless growth trajectory.
What I always keep in mind for further growth is the continuous creation of future growth opportunities. Mitsui currently has a pipeline of investment projects totaling more than 6 trillion yen, but precisely because the management environment is highly uncertain, it is necessary to rigorously assess the strategic significance and competitive advantages of each project. Under MTMP2029, we will thoroughly apply this approach and carefully select projects in which Mitsui can truly demonstrate its unique value, thereby steadily building the earnings base that will support the next stage of growth.

The reason Mitsui has been able to build relationships with leading partners over the long term lies in our consistent stance of sincerely addressing current challenges while always taking a long-term perspective to create high added value.
In our partnerships, I believe multi-layered engagement is extremely important, encompassing not only top management on both sides but also the people in charge on the front lines. As trust is built not only at the management level but also on the frontline level, it becomes possible to operate businesses with long-term consistency, which in turn leads to opportunities to jointly create high-quality projects.
Furthermore, I believe Mitsui is a company that can provide the missing piece for our partners. In addition to the industry expertise and business-driving capabilities we have accumulated through many years of business activities, Mitsui has built up many functions and strengths it can provide to partners, including diverse professional talent and a global network. By optimally combining these across business and regional boundaries, we can help solve the issues partners face and create business opportunities, thereby creating value together. I believe that the virtuous cycle generated by these long-term, win-win relationships, is the source of Mitsui’s competitive advantage.

Mitsui’s comprehensive strength is supported by ideas generated through collaboration among professional talent across business fields and areas of expertise, and by the capability to turn those ideas into businesses across our global operations. This is precisely Mitsui’s strength and the source of nonlinear combinatory value. One specific example is the world’s first blue ammonia project, realized through collaboration among professional talent from different fields such as energy, chemicals, and infrastructure. It is a symbolic example of value creation through collaboration across different areas of expertise and a tangible embodiment of combinatory value.*
In recent years, advances in AI have created an environment in which combinations of ideas and businesses that could not be fully identified through human experience and knowledge alone can be explored more quickly and comprehensively. In Bloom, Mitsui’s global talent management system, data on the experience, achievements, strengths, and expertise of professional talent is continuously accumulated and updated on a global basis. By utilizing this data, we will be able to discover new combinations of people and knowledge that were previously difficult to grasp and form optimal teams more efficiently. Through these initiatives, Mitsui’s new business development capabilities will be further enhanced, accelerating the creation of future combinatory value.
Within Mitsui, cross-industry initiatives have already begun in various fields, including collaboration between the medical and drug discovery industries through the combination of healthcare and data, and collaboration between our operations in new fuels and ships. Going forward, we will further increase both opportunities for the realization of such projects and the impact through value creation.

* As the next stage of leveraging our comprehensive strength, we aim to generate nonlinear combinatory value—an evolution in value creation that comes from combining the expertise of our professional talent and AI’s exploratory power in new ways.

The reason we presented our vision for 2030 is that large-scale, robust, long-term projects that will form the future earnings base have been steadily accumulated, and we now have a clear outlook that their results will fully emerge from 2030 onward. In addition, projects that will begin contributing to earnings during MTMP2029 are also making steady progress, and we believe we have reached the stage where we can present a more concrete growth path from the present toward 2030.
The year 2030 is not the goal, but one milestone toward further growth beyond that point. Considering the ramping-up of large-scale projects expected to make full-scale earnings contributions from 2030 onward, we believe there is further room for growth beyond 1.4 trillion yen, which is why we express it as over 1.4 trillion yen. The 1.4 trillion yen figure and ROE of 13% are positioned as the starting point for the next stage of growth. To that end, we will first steadily achieve the targets of MTMP2029 and connect it to growth beyond that.

The middle game refers to initiatives aimed at continuously enhancing business value through measures to strengthen, improve efficiency of, and turnaround existing businesses, and is a core activity for raising base profit.
Its essence lies in anticipating changes in the management environment and acting half a step ahead. I believe the key to middle game initiatives is anticipation. By maintaining a high sensitivity to potential future changes and taking proactive action, we enhance business value. This not only enables us to capture the seeds of growth early, but also helps avoid future risks and crises.
Thoroughly implementing middle game initiatives not only improves the base profit of businesses we own, but also increases asset value at the time of sale during the asset recycling phase, leading to greater cash generation. These effects create extremely significant economic value for Mitsui.
Another important point is that people who can steadily execute middle game initiatives are also well equipped to lead high-quality M&A. This is because, precisely through their efforts to enhance the value of existing businesses in middle game initiatives, they develop a better eye for new investments and are also able to carry out effective value enhancement after investment. I believe middle game initiatives are not only about improving existing businesses, but are also important for increasing the probability of success in future investments for growth and M&A.

In the Mineral & Metal Resources and Energy segments, large-scale projects are expected to ramp up toward 2030, and we continue to position these businesses as an important earnings base for Mitsui. In these businesses, while diversifying geographically, we will enhance the sustainability and reproducibility of earnings based on highly competitive assets with abundant, high-quality reserves that support long-term production.
At the same time, Mitsui is not aiming for a portfolio dependent on any particular area of business. In addition to the Mineral & Metal Resources and Energy segments, we will build a portfolio unique to Mitsui by enabling each business area, such as mobility, materials centered on chemicals, and healthcare, to grow by leveraging their respective strengths.
Through this kind of portfolio management, we intend to grow base profit in a well-balanced manner across all segments. At the same time, during phases of rising commodity prices, the Mineral & Metal Resources and Energy segments are expected to provide upside for earnings expansion. We will aim to build a highly resilient portfolio that is well diversified along both regional axes, including developed and emerging countries, and business axes.

We are strongly committed to achieving our ROE target. We will work to improve ROE by advancing both the strengthening of earnings capability through middle game initiatives and investments for growth, and the improvement of capital efficiency, including shareholder returns. In addition, in the current highly uncertain environment, it is important to secure a substantial level of Management Allocation* and maintain a broad range of management optionality. On that basis, while steadily executing high-quality investments for growth and continuing the progressive dividend policy, we will flexibly implement additional shareholder returns, including share repurchases, to continuously enhance value per share. We will continue to engage closely with stakeholders in response to changes in the management environment.
We also recognize that there is room to increase financial leverage from the current level. While appropriately utilizing financial leverage as we assess the management environment, we will achieve our ROE target by thoroughly implementing Mitsui’s unique integrated risk management, which centrally identifies and manages a wide range of quantitative and qualitative risks across the entire company.

* Options for investments for growth and additional shareholder returns according to future opportunities

When formulating the plan for MTMP2026, we set relatively conservative assumptions in light of market volatility. We then lifted targets as needed, made revisions along the way, and achieved growth. I do not view a highly uncertain management environment negatively. Rather, I believe that the greater the fluctuations in the operating environment, the greater Mitsui’s role in society becomes, and the more opportunities there are to provide new value to customers.
We will steadily capture such opportunities by leveraging business models and agility that transcend business boundaries. In addition, by steadily building value across our existing businesses through middle game initiatives, we will reliably achieve the targets set out in MTMP2029. At the same time, based on integrated risk management we have cultivated over many years, we will provide value to society as a supplier of essential services that meets customers’ longterm real demand by combining domain expertise accumulated in each business field, technology, logistics, finance, human capital, and other capabilities.
Through the provision of such value, we will also address various issues related to scarcity that are emerging around the world, provide real solutions to society, and enhance corporate value.

Mitsui can be thought of as a group of professionals, of which each individual is capable of making decisions in an independent manner, and can create businesses with other Mitsui employees or people outside the Group that share the same aspirations. I want them to be independent thinkers who can think, judge, and act on their own.
In addition, it is also important that they understand characteristics of each geography. Mitsui is an organization with a global matrix structure based on both regional and business axes, and I believe that gaining experience along both axes leads to the ability to build relationships with leading global partners and create businesses rooted in local markets.
On that basis, we also emphasize frontline-based leadership grounded in expertise and experience, and we would like to develop talent who can make their own judgments based on the experience they have cultivated at each frontline site, engage those around them, and lead businesses and projects. At the same time, not only the ability to stand at the forefront as the main actor, but also the flexibility and humility to play an essential supporting role depending on the situation, are important qualities.
I believe that when such people collaborate across business and regional boundaries, Mitsui’s unique comprehensive strength is demonstrated, leading to the creation of new value.

Mitsui aims to become a global first-tier company. While valuing our roots as a company originating in Japan, we aim to further enhance our global presence.
Even 50 years from now, I believe Mitsui will continue to be a company whose business portfolio changes with the times. However, our foundation will not change. We want to always be a company that meets the needs of customers and continues to provide value to them.
Going forward, we will continue to be a dynamic company that keeps evolving by enhancing base profit and profitability, creating new businesses and business models, and constantly generating distinctive added value that is unique to Mitsui.