Leiji Matsumoto
Most mangaka started out as assistants, such as Miwa Ueda to Naoko Takeuchi, Leiji Matsumoto to Osamu Tezuka, Kaoru Shintani to Leiji Matsumoto, and Eiichiro Oda, Hiroyuki Takei and Mikio Itō to Nobuhiro Watsuki, who was himself an assistant to Takeshi Obata. It is also possible for an assistant to have an entire career as such without becoming an independent mangaka. Assistants, particularly specialists, may work with several different mangaka at the same time, and many assistants also self-publish works of their own in the dōjinshi scene.