Several of the top investment management firms operating in areas including non-listed assets are seeking to expand into the wealth management area, seeking business from HNW individuals.

KKR, aka Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, has appointed Yoshi Takemoto in Tokyo as manging director to lead its global wealth solutions platform in Japan. 

The move by the New York-listed firm comes at a time when a number of private markets investments big hitters, such as Blackstone, BlackRock and Carlyle, are also tapping into HNW individuals as a source of client.

“Japan is a key market for KKR’s private wealth strategy, and we believe that Japanese individual investors can benefit from greater access to our private market investment expertise,” Markus Egloff, head of global solutions (international), said in a statement late last week. Takemoto will report to Egloff/

Previously, Takemoto was founding member of Blackstone’s wealth team in Japan and served as the country’s head of product strategy. Before this, he worked at Nikko Asset Management, serving as head of product development and oversaw the firm’s alternative product strategies. He began his career at Shizuoka Bank. 

KKR opened its Tokyo office in 2006. Today, it runs about $18 billion in AuM in Japan, which forms the largest part of KKR’s Asia Pacific portfolio.