Miki Watanabe (渡邉 美樹, Watanabe Miki; born October 5, 1959) is a Japanese entrepreneur and politician. He founded the Watami chain of izakaya restaurants and headed the company until 2011, when he resigned to run in the 2011 Tokyo gubernatorial election. Watanabe's run for the governorship of Tokyo was inspired by Michael Bloomberg's mayorship of New York City. Watanabe came in third with 16.8%, losing to incumbent governor Shintaro Ishihara.
Source: “Miki Watanabe”, English Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), excerpt