Hidetoshi Nakata Keynote Speaker

Hidetoshi Nakata is the founder of Japan Craft Sake Company Co. Ltd (JCSC) and a former national football player.

Hidetoshi Nakata is widely considered to be the greatest Asian player of all time. In 1996, he competed in the Atlanta Olympics and became the first Japanese football player to compete in a World Cup. His performance in the 1998 World Cup in France attracted attention from around the world and seven months later, he was signed by A.C. Perugia Calcio in Italy’s Serie A.

From there, Nakata went on to play for several other top teams in Italy and England, even contributing to the league championship of the prestigious A.S. Roma. In total, Hidetoshi Nakata’s football career spanned eight seasons and five teams. He also led the Japan team in three consecutive World Cups and represented the country in two Olympic games.

In 2006, Nakata announced his retirement to pursue a different career. At the 2014 Golden Foot awards, he was named an All Time Legend. An award given to retiring players who have made outstanding achievements in football history. Nakata is the first Asian to receive this honour. He currently serves as an adviser to FIFA’s International Football Association Board (IFAB).

After his retirement, Nakata spent his time travelling to find his new purpose in life. In 2009, he began a journey around Japan’s 47 prefectures to learn more about the country’s culture. From the southern islands of Okinawa to the northernmost point of Hokkaido, the trip took seven years and brought him into contact with the culture and craftsmanship of each prefecture, including farming, sake brewing and traditional crafts.

Inspired by that experience, Nakata launched Nihonmono, a travel and lifestyle website that lists his personal recommendations to support Japan’s traditional culture and crafts. In 2015, he founded Japan Craft Sake Company Co. Ltd to develop various businesses related to sake and Japan’s traditional industries. The company developed Sakenomy, a sake app and e-commerce platform which has the most comprehensive database of sake products and brewery information in Japan.

A year later, JCSC launched Craft Sake Week, a popular event dedicated to sake that has become the largest and most influential “sake culture” event in the world. Recently JCSC developed its own innovative Sake Blockchain technology to ensure product traceability and genuine quality assurance.

In 2022, Hidetoshi Nakata created luxury tea brand, Hanaahu Tea, a range of Japanese teas designed specifically for food pairing, in collaboration with Japan’s leading tea experts and artisan producers. Nakata wants to continue developing solution-based systems for the advancement of traditional industries and benefit our future generations.