Fuji Television Network’s Ryuji Komiya joined the TV Formats Festival’s Asian Innovation strand to highlight Japan’s gains in the global format business.

Komiya heads up unscripted format sales at the Japanese broadcaster, which originated the iconic Iron Chef. You can watch Komiya’s session, which wrapped the conference portion of the TV Formats Festival, here.

“Our classic titles, such as Iron Chef and Hole in the Wall, which is distributed by Fremantle, are gaining more popularity over the last couple of years,” Komiya said. Newer properties, such as Run for Money and the Saturday night prime-time hit VS School—The Ultimate Hide and Seek are also gaining traction.

Language has been the biggest obstacle for Japanese IP owners to overcome when navigating the global business. “So it’s essential for us to be able to create formats that are visually entertaining or non-verbal. People say, do you have any crazy Japanese game shows? Japanese formats, in general, they’re visually entertaining to watch, even if you don’t understand the language. So language is a challenge. But I think we were able to overcome that, turning that into an opportunity for us to create an original format that is visually entertaining.”

Fuji Television Network has used two approaches to co-development, Komiya said. One is creating new formats from scratch, such as The Swap Project with Phil Gurin, and the other is in redeveloping older formats, as it is doing with France’s StoryPlus. “Entering a partnership with other countries, you can gain valuable insights from different parts of the world,” he said.

Komiya’s colleagues are exploring the scripted format business, with Fuji home to four weekly dramas per season, resulting in 16 titles a year. Europe and the U.S. are challenging markets, but other Asian territories hold potential, with Komiya referencing a deal in Thailand with GMM.