Japanese pop music talent agency to divide its business due to a scandal, according to Nikkei.

The Nikkei reported on Saturday that Johnny & Associates, Inc., a talent agency for J-POP, will create a new company specifically for talent management, separating it from its current main operations.

According to Nikkei, a Japanese company owned by a family, will prioritize providing compensation to hundreds of individuals who were identified as victims of sexual abuse by its former leader, Johnny Kitagawa, for more than 40 years. The company, which is more well-known than most of its individual stars, has recently admitted to not being able to prevent Mr. Kitagawa’s repeated sexual misconduct.

In the previous month, two leading beer companies in Japan, Suntory Holdings Ltd. and Kirin Holdings Co., announced their decision to sever business connections with the country’s largest agency. Julie Keiko Fujishima, the niece of the agency’s founder, stepped down from her position in September following an investigation that revealed instances of the music mogul’s misconduct from the 1970s to the 2010s.

According to Bloomberg, before his passing in 2019, Mr. Kitagawa was responsible for launching popular boy bands such as Hikaru Genji, SMAP, Arashi, and Sexy Zone into the global music industry’s second-largest market and beyond. The new company may potentially be named based on suggestions from fans.