ONE Championship Chairman and CEO Chatri Sityodtong's goal for ONE Championship is for it to be bigger in Japan than Pride FC ever was.

Sityodtong expressed as much when he was a guest on Ariel Helwani's MMA Show earlier this month, saying that ONE has the potential to be a bigger promotion than the legendary Japan-based mixed martial arts promotion.

Singapore-based ONE Championship recently wrapped up their 2018 calendar of events after putting on more than 20 shows all over Asia.

In 2019, the Asian martial arts promotion is set to hold 30 events, including stops new markets such as Korea and Japan.

Japan was the marquee of the promotion's announcement of their full 2019 schedule, as they held the press conference in Tokyo.

There, they also confirmed that ONE would be heading to Japan for the first time, with two shows in Tokyo in March and October of 2019.

For Sityodtong, ONE breaking ground in Japan is the start of what can be called a revival of sorts for the country's fading mixed martial arts scene.

'Japan is at an all-time low in terms of martial arts, MMA,” Sityodtong said. 'Since the Pride days, it's literally gone south, and it's because of the whole mafia connection that used to run the martial arts scene here.”

Sityodtong hopes that ONE's mission of celebrating martial arts values will be the spark that Japan needs.

'For me it's an opportunity for a revival, a renaissance if you will, and we ignite Japan. If you look at Japan, every child in Japan is dealing with Karate, Kendo, Aikido, Judo, that's teaching kids values.”.

'I think it's a huge opportunity, if done in the right, authentic way, to bring back martial arts and make it the most popular sport again,” he continued.

For a decade, Pride FC was the premier mixed martial arts promotion in Asia.

Operating out of Japan, Pride went toe-to-toe with its North American counterparts and ultimately became the home of some of the sport's biggest legends, including Fedor Emelianenko, Minotauro Noguiera, Wanderlei Silva, and more.

In recent years, ONE, who embraces the same spectacle that Pride used to have, has drawn comparisons with the Asian mixed martial arts pioneer promotion.

Sityodtong believes however, that ONE is already a bigger entity in terms of viewership globally.

The focus now, is to make ONE bigger in Japan.

'My goal is to make it bigger than Pride ever was in Japan. We're already much much bigger than Pride ever was in terms of, if you look at our viewership numbers and stuff like that, we're far bigger than Pride ever was, but I'm talking about Japan, specifically. I believe we have the chance to be much bigger than Pride ever was,” he expressed.

ONE heads to Tokyo on March 31st and returns on October 11th.