Japanese fast fashion company Uniqlo’s founder Tadashi Yanai has once again donated $31 million to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), marking the largest donation ever received by the Humanities College.
According to a statement released on Thursday, the latest donation will go to the “Yanai Initiative” fund established a decade ago.
In 2014, Yanai donated $2.5 million to create the “Yanai Initiative”, aimed at promoting collaboration between UCLA and Japan’s prestigious Waseda University, as well as strengthening student and faculty exchanges between the two universities.
In 2020, he donated $25 million to UCLA to advance the globalization of Japanese humanities studies and solidify UCLA’s leading position in Japanese literature, language, and cultural studies.
Reportedly, a significant portion of Yanai’s latest donation will be used to fund a network center called “Japan Past and Present”, which will serve as a one-stop service center for scholars worldwide.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the 75-year-old Yanai has a net worth of $48.3 billion and is Japan’s richest person. His Uniqlo company owns brands such as Uniqlo and Theory. He had served on the board of SoftBank Group, chaired by Masayoshi Son, for many years before resigning nearly five years ago.