Akira Maeda
RINGS was founded by Akira Maeda on May 11, 1991, following the dissolution of Newborn UWF. At that time, Maeda and Mitsuya Nagai were the only two people to transfer from UWF, wrestlers such as Kiyoshi Tamura, Hiromitsu Kanehara and Kenichi Yamamoto would later also transfer from UWF International.