General trading company,YAMANAKA-SHOKAI

2018

On 26th June 2017, a revolution occurred in Shogi world.
Japan's youngest professional Shogi player, 14-year-old Sota Fujii, sets new record with 29th straight win. All Japanese called him a prodigy and praised his admirable achievement.

Meanwhile, on 20th June of the same year, a great legendary player left Shogi world.
Japan's oldest professional Shogi player, 77-year-old Hifumi Kato, entered retirement in a career that spanned more than six decades. His career lasted 62 years and 10 months. In 1954 he became a professional player at age 14 and 7 months -- then a record for the youngest pro player. His record stood until 2016, when Sota Fujii went pro at age 14 and 2 months.

The two geniuses are in opposite phases in their Shogi life.
We should remind myself their extraordinary feats were accomplished by not only their talent but also their continuous hard efforts over long periods of time. This should be the reason why the two men attract us so much.

Not only Shogi world, we all have various phases in our life.
We sometimes face difficulties, struggle, suffer and get stuck. It is easy to give up. A baseball player can put down his bat, a singer can put down his/her microphone and a Shogi player can put down his pieces. But it must be done after doing everything what you can do. People who accomplished that are indeed beautiful.

41 years have already passed since I started our company with a strong motive, "I want to do business to let my customers say 'We are really waiting for you!', even if I do not gain 1 JPY profit.".
I am getting older and it seems that the time has come to think about putting down my crown. At the same time, I also feel a strong passion is coming up in my heart to contribute for the world's sake by my business.

Let's go for broke with this ambitious man!