General counsel | MUFG Innovation Partners
Kenji Hosokawa
General counsel | MUFG Innovation Partners
What are the most significant cases, projects or transactions that you and your legal team have recently been involved in?
The most noticeable new trend over the past year or so has been the dramatic increase in the number of AI startups. As a fintech venture capital, we have always sought out the most innovative technological developments, and from that point of view, AI is not new to us. However, the proportion of AI startups within the startup economy has surged globally. We are excited to have participated in the financing rounds of promising, high-profile startups such as sakana.ai (evolutionary AI model merge), MNTSQ (AI-powered legaltech), Auxia (agentic AI marketing platform), and Kasanare (retrieval-augmented generation).
How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crisis to ensure the organisation’s resilience?
The United States is our most important geographic market, and as such, we have been affected by the often-chaotic scale and pace of regulatory changes introduced under the Trump administration. It has been extremely difficult to identify what is essential to us and to avoid being distracted by numerous changes that are not relevant. The leading U.S. law firms have been instrumental in helping us stay focused. I read the newsletters of several firms I trust and have occasionally asked them to provide training on key regulatory developments, particularly in financial regulation. As a VC, we play the long game and are not overly concerned by short-term market volatility. Historically, the best startups tend to emerge when the market hits rock bottom.
What strategies do you employ to ensure the successful digital transformation of a legal department while maintaining compliance with your country’s data protection laws?
Last year, we acquired an AI-powered legaltech solution that has significantly improved our contract management. Prior to that, we used SharePoint to store contracts, which became unwieldy as we continued to grow and the number of contracts we managed increased. As the corporate venture capital arm of a Japanese banking group (MUFG), we follow a rigorous vetting process before adopting any cloud-based solution, as we must ensure that any documents uploaded to the platform remain secure and compliant with our confidentiality obligations as well as relevant data protection requirements.
Have you had any experiences during your career as a lawyer that stand out as particularly unique or interesting?
I was a successful law firm partner for several years before deciding to move in-house. Although this is a common career path in the United States, it remains relatively rare in Japan. I recall some of my lawyer friends advising me against making the move. While there are aspects of law firm life that I do miss, I have no regrets about the decision. I hope the in-house legal market in Japan will continue to expand, creating more interesting opportunities for lawyers who are eager to embrace new challenges.
What is a cause, business or otherwise, that you are passionate about? Why is this?
I do a lot of things outside my day job. For instance, I am a partner at SVP Tokyo, an organisation that supports non-profits and social enterprises in scaling their impact. I serve on the boards of several non-profits, either as a board member or auditor. I also teach a course at a law school. Although managing these various responsibilities can be challenging, I believe they all contribute to making me a better person, and better at what I do in my day job.
General counsel | MUFG Innovation Partners
General counsel | MUFG Innovation Partners
