Yusaku Maezawa (前澤 友作, Maezawa Yūsaku, born 22 November 1975) is a Japanese billionaire entrepreneur and art collector. He founded Start Today in 1998 and launched the online fashion retail website Zozotown in 2004, now Japan's largest. Most recently, Maezawa introduced a custom-fit apparel brand ZOZO and at-home measurement system, the ZOZOSUIT, in 2018.^[2] As of December 2021, he is estimated by Forbes to have a net worth of $2.0 billion.^[1]

Quick Facts Born, Occupation(s) ...

Yusaku Maezawa
前澤 友作
Maezawa in 2021
Born	(1975-11-22) 22 November 1975 (age 48) Kamagaya, Japan
Occupation(s)	Entrepreneur, art collector
Years active	1998–present
Organization(s)	Start Today, Zozotown, ZOZO
Spouse	Divorced
Children	1[1]
Space career
Space Adventures space tourist
Time in space	11 days, 19 hours, 34 minutes
Missions	Soyuz MS-20, dearMoon project (planned)
Mission insignia

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Maezawa began attending Waseda Jitsugyo High School in 1991, where he started a hardcore punk band with his classmates called Switch Style [ja], in which he was the drummer.^[3][4] The band released their first EP in 1993.^[5] After graduating from high school, he decided not to go to college; instead he moved to the US with a girlfriend, where he started collecting CDs and records.^[6] When he returned to Japan in 1995, his album collection became the basis for his first company, which sold imported albums and CDs through the mail.^[3]

In 1998, Maezawa used the basis of the mail-order album business to launch the company Start Today.^[7] The same year, his band signed with the label BMG Japan. By 2000, Start Today had moved to an online platform, had begun selling clothing, and had become a public company. In 2001, Maezawa declared a hiatus on his music career. Start Today opened the retail clothing website Zozotown in 2004, and six years later, Start Today became a publicly traded company, listed on the "Mothers" Index of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. By 2012, Start Today was listed in the First Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange.^[8]

In 2018, Maezawa introduced ZOZO, a custom-fit clothing brand and the ZOZOSUIT, an at-home measurement system, in over 72 countries and territories.^[9]

Maezawa resigned from ZOZO in September 2019 after selling a stake of 50.1% in the company to SoftBank for US$3.7 billion (400 billion Yen). He also sold 30% of his personal stake in ZoZo to Yahoo Japan.^[10]

Maezawa is the founder of the Tokyo-based Contemporary Art Foundation, which he started in 2012 with a goal of "supporting young artists as a pillar of the next generation of contemporary art."^[11] The Contemporary Art Foundation currently hosts collection shows twice a year. In May 2016, Maezawa attracted significant media attention with a record purchase price at auction of $57.3 million for an Untitled (1982) artwork of a devil by Jean-Michel Basquiat, and broke a record again in May 2017 with a $110.5 million auction for another Untitled (1982) of a skull by the same artist.^[12] At the same 2016 auction, Maezawa bought pieces by Bruce Nauman, Alexander Calder, Richard Prince, and Jeff Koons, spending a total of $98 million over two days.^[13] Maezawa plans to open a contemporary art museum in Chiba, which will house his collection.^[11] In 2022, Maezawa sold an untitled Basquiat Painting for $85 Million.^[14]

On 5 January 2019, Maezawa successfully secured the most ever retweets for his Twitter message offering one million yen (approx US$9300) each to 100 randomly selected people who retweeted the message and followed him.^[29] More than four million people ended up retweeting Maezawa's tweet and following him.^[4]

Later that year, on 31 December, he secured the second spot in the list of most-retweeted tweets by offering one million yen (approx US$9200) each to 1000 randomly selected people who retweeted the Twitter message and followed him.^[30] The message surpassed the 3 million retweets mark.^{[citation needed]}

He is divorced, with one child, and lives in Chiba, Japan.^[1]