Increasingly confident of victory in its battle with The Children’s Investment Fund, Japan’s largest electric utility is throwing the British activist hedge fund a bone.

Electric Power Development Co., better known as J-Power, said it will add three new non-executive directors to its board. Masayoshi Kitamura, deputy CEO of J-Power, told the Sunday Telegraph that the appointments could take some time, and that the company remains opposed to TCI’s seven shareholder proposals.

J-Power may feel in a position to be magnanimous: Yoshihiko Nakagaki, personally targeted for ousting by TCI, told the Japanese newspaper Sankei that the company’s management can win majority support from its shareholders, despite TCI’s very public battle and lobbying effort.

Sankei reports that Kitamura has been meeting with U.S. and European investors, finding that at least some overseas investors are not backing TCI’s efforts, which seek improved corporate governance and returns for investors, among other things.

TCI, which owns 9.9% of J-Power and earlier this year was rebuffed in its effort to double that stake, has also pushed for a bylaw change requiring the utility to appoint three independent directors. Kitamura told Sankei that the company would consider independent directors in the future, but not a rule requiring a minimum number of them.