SportsPro print editor Michael Long returns to reveal all to editor at large Eoin Connolly about his recent trip to Japan, taking the pulse of the sports industry there ahead of the Rugby World Cup this year and the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. There's the latest on what the local organising committees for both of those events are thinking, and a sense from MMA's ONE Championship of what it takes to make a mark in the country. 

Meanwhile, in an interview from SportsPro OTT Asia in Singapore, Rakuten's Laura Li talks about the Japanese ecommerce giant's partnerships with the likes of the NBA and how OTT video and data are being filtered through its ecosystem.