ITOCHU Corporation (headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Eizo Kobayashi, President; hereinafter “ITOCHU”) announced today that it has agreed to execute a memorandum (of understanding) with UNY Co., Ltd. (headquartered in Inazawa, Aichi Prefecture; Tetsuro Maemura, President; hereinafter “UNY”) that would create a capital and business alliance between the two companies. Details are as follows.

1.Background for the Memorandum and Its Contents

UNY is a general retailer of clothing, food, household goods, and leisure, operating 235 stores in 20 prefectures, primarily in the Kanto, Hokuriku and Tokai regions. It aims to be “A Retailer that Creates New Life” and to maintain the trust of the public and its communities.

ITOCHU Corporation positions daily consumer items as one of its key target markets in its medium-term management plan Frontiere, and has enthusiastically supported companies in the retail business.

Since signing a memorandum for comprehensive cooperation in January 2006, UNY Group and ITOCHU Group have expanded the scope of the memorandum from its initial agreement on food distribution to textiles and daily goods/sundries. The two companies have consequently built upon their cooperative relationship.

Believing that they have gained a sufficient understanding of each other and that they have established strong ties, UNY and ITOCHU have concluded that they are now capable of improving each other’s corporate value even further by making greater effective use of their respective management resources. The companies have therefore decided to expand the scope of the partnership again, and now enter into a capital and business alliance. Specifically, the alliance will organically combine UNY's stores, customers, and product development functions with ITOCHU's retail support functions in the global network, procurement, information technology, and distribution know-how, while promoting joint activities to bolster their respective corporate values.

To strengthen the cooperative relationship and trust between the two companies further, UNY and ITOCHU have agreed that ITOCHU will acquire UNY stock. ITOCHU plans to acquire approximately 3% of UNY's issued stock both on and off the market by the end of March 2010.

2.Areas of Cooperation

1 Product development, sales and procurement
2 Information technology and logistics
3 Real estate development and developer businesses
4 Overseas business operations
5 Joint efforts on recycling food waste
6 Strengthening product/material procurement and product developments, and cost-cutting initiatives
7 Discussing joint work on agriculture
8 Joint effort to establish a demand chain
9 Other areas as agreed to by the two companies

Areas (1) to (3) were subjects of the business cooperation agreement on January 2006. The latest agreement strengthens this cooperation further.

3.Profile of the Two Companies

UNY Co., Ltd. Profile

ITOCHU Corporation Profile