Ryo Nishikido
On October 7, 2011, it was announced that both Ryo Nishikido and Tomohisa Yamashita left the group. The official press release from Johnny &amp; Associates explained that Nishikido was leaving because scheduling conflicts made it difficult for him to be active in both NEWS and Kanjani8, while Yamashita was leaving to concentrate on solo projects. Nishikido continued his activities with Kanjani8 but not NEWS. NEWS continued as a four-member group with Keiichiro Koyama, Takahisa Masuda, Shigeaki Kato and Yuya Tegoshi.