Astellas continues to keep its racist culture. Just look at the leadership of Astellas, You have to be either Japanese which would make sense since this is a Japanese company or you have to be a white male or female. Being part of what is called Northshore culture, if you are in HQ in Illinois, is really a plus.
Otherwise, you will be pushed out for various reasons, they call it a cultural difference, by the HR that once again is a 90% white. I am completing my PhD thesis in business culture and psychology and have look at and interviewed many former and current employees from 3 different Pharma culture; American, European and Japanese. I sampled 2 to 4 companies from each region; Pfizer, JJ, BMS, Giliad, Sanofi, Astellas, TAKEDA, GSK etc. Unfortunately worst companies were Astellas, followed by TAKEDA. I also realized that among Pharma companies that had their HQ or major office in USA, Midwest had a worst repetition and again, Astellas was in top of the list followed by TAKEDA, Abbott/Abbvie etc. After that with the help from colleagues, I ran a search about some folks who are working in such companies and interestingly found out that in Astellas also contains folks who have had right wing exteremist attitude and or have even been sympathizer of well known right wing radicals. One specific case is a female employee of Astellas HR who had lived in California and during such time, actively had participated in radical right wing groups.
There were similar cases in Abbvie.
Thus far my research had shown that Midwest companies in general and Japanese companies specifically have the worst work environment, unfortunately Astellas is in the top.