Hello, it's great to have your company again.

Welcome to another instalment of Mlex's podcast, covering the top stories in regulatory affairs

with the assistance of our team of reporters around the globe.

Today a special edition of the program to mark the publication of a significant special report.

It's our profile of Kazayuki Furuya, the chairman of the Japan Fair Trade Commission.

Our Tokyo correspondence, Satchiko Sakamaki and Toko Sekiguchi, were able to spend several hours with the chairman,

and they covered a lot of ground, as is evidenced by the contents of the special report,

which you can download now from the MLEX website.

And it's a must-read for anyone with an interest in some of the hot topics that our Japan team has been covering of late.

Toko and Sachiko asked for Ruya about his personal history,

his views on the role of the antitrust regulator and grappling with soaring inflation and population decline,

as well as the very Japanese concern over the abuse of superior bargaining position

and fears that small to medium enterprises are being unfairly burdened by growing costs.

There's so much to talk about, and luckily for us, Toko and Sachiko have joined me now from Tokyo.

Toko, firstly, you mention in the profile story that Furuya comes from a long

career in the finance ministry. Can you tell me a little more about that and anything in his

background that might give us an idea about, firstly, who he is, but also what kind of an impact

he's had in his role as chief of competition.

Sure, James. Fudia's father was a judge, but instead of following in his father's footsteps

to become a judge, he decided to join the Ministry of Finance, which is a very elite agency

in the Japanese government. He was there from 1978 to 2012, so that's 35 years.

He was mostly in the taxes department and also the budget department. He then went on to the

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