Nintendo considering mergers and acquisitions, says president

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata says the company is considering mergers and acquisitions as an option for its strategy going forward, following a financial report that showed Wii U still floundering.

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Nintendo spent some time last week explaining its revised strategies, following a rough year for the company. Among those were exploring mobile, streamlining its existing products, and even launching an initiative focused on "quality of life" products. Even with all those gears turning, though, mergers and acquisitions are a possibility.

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata acknowledged the possible strategy during an interview with Nikkei (via Joystiq). "We should abandon old assumptions about our businesses. We are considering M&As as an option," he said. "For this reason, we'll step up share buybacks."

He didn't give any indication of what companies Nintendo might be eyeing for such a move, but he did signal that whatever happens, Nintendo will remain a publicly traded company. Though he acknowledged that quarterly earnings reports are "not a good fit" for Nintendo, he thinks going public has ultimately done the company good. "It is thanks to the stock market that Nintendo has grown to what it is today," Iwata said. "I don't want to turn to a management buyout just because we are inconvenienced now."

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  • reply
    February 3, 2014 6:20 AM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, Nintendo considering mergers and acquisitions, says president.

    Nintendo president Satoru Iwata says the company is considering mergers and acquisitions as an option for its strategy going forward, following a financial report that showed Wii U still floundering.

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      February 3, 2014 6:31 AM

      Should have snapped up Atlus when they had a chance.

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      February 3, 2014 6:51 AM

      Wow, that last quote from Iwata is the stuff of Harvard case studies. Every executive with a brain and a conscience believes that and wants to scream it at anyone who's overly obsessed with just the individual quarter's performance and incremental bonus rather than the long term health of the company (oh, I lived through that, and that company shut its doors while alienating its customers at the same time.. nice!).

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      February 3, 2014 6:55 AM

      I can't believe they're going all in on the gamepad. Like the guys on Weekend Confirmed said, they're a year too late to start considering developing unique games for the gamepad.

      The only possible rationalization at this point could be that the Wii U simply isn't going to sell well regardless of its price, so they may as well just keep the gamepad in. I think it could sell a lot more at $200 w/o the pad, especially after Mario Kart SSB comes out. All they have to do is go back and patch a few games.

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        February 3, 2014 8:05 AM

        People make assumptions all the time. Imagine if they dropped the 3ds support.

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      February 3, 2014 6:58 AM

      time to go all in on a subscription based mario MMO.

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        February 3, 2014 7:17 AM

        A Pokemon MMO could be done, but they do want to go there.

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          February 3, 2014 8:07 AM

          I'm surprised they haven't done a proper Pokemon game for the Wii or Wii U... that would sell like hotcakes.

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            February 3, 2014 8:22 AM

            People have been saying that since the n64 days, for some reason they've just ignored that potential money maker.

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              February 3, 2014 8:37 AM

              Probably the development costs on all those 3D models. The 2D games sell well and have better margins, maybe?

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                February 3, 2014 8:53 AM

                Pokemon X & Y has 3D models... but I'd imagine it would be a ton of work to do a proper game on a home console.

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                February 3, 2014 9:45 AM

                They already have them 3D modeled - they've had a 3D Pokedex on the 3DS basically since launch.

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                February 3, 2014 3:08 PM

                Eh, they could make billions, thats plenty of cash to pay a few hundred animators.

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        February 3, 2014 5:45 PM

        A Nintendo themed free to play MOBA why has it not been done yet

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          February 3, 2014 6:30 PM

          I've always toyed with the idea of what would the Smash Bros. of top down (ala zelda) would be like.

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      February 3, 2014 7:57 AM

      Some of their best games 10-20 years back came from 2nd / 3rd party work.

      Rare - Goldeneye, Donkey Kong Country

      Retro - Metroid Prime

      Argonaut - Starfox, Mario 64

      HAL Labs - hmmm well... A LOT. Kirby, Earthbound, Smash Bros.

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        February 3, 2014 8:09 AM

        Argonaut had nothing to do with Mario 64.

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          February 3, 2014 2:30 PM

          Buzzz wrong. They had a lot to do with M64. They practically created the engine it was based on and proposed the idea to Nintendo.

          It was originally a 3d platformer starring Yoshi. Nintendo basically screwed Argonaut real bad by cutting ties, then months later taking their concept to make Mario 64. Argonaut did a lot for Nintendo when they were dabbling into 3d.

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        February 3, 2014 8:41 AM

        Losing Rare was very bad. They played a major role in keeping the N64 relevant against the massive support for Playstation.

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          February 3, 2014 9:14 AM

          Yeah but did you see the games Rare made after Microsoft acquired them? Maybe they made the right move.

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            February 3, 2014 10:33 AM

            Key talent left and Rare wasn't the same without those guys. Maybe they would have stuck around under Nintendo leadership. (Maybe not.)

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          February 3, 2014 9:16 AM

          It wasn't that bad of a move in retrospect though. They are no where near the same developer they were when they were with Nintendo. Honestly, now, in retrospect, it was a good move to let them go. Microsoft has completely misused them, but even when they made their more traditional games, they weren't that good. Kameo was pretty weak, Perfect Dark Zero was garbage, and Banjo was pretty terrible (I loved the first two games and Nuts & Bolts was not good).

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            February 3, 2014 10:00 AM

            I just assumed that was more because of MS's poor management and talent jumping ship. The timespliter's series was decent and created by ex-rare employees.

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            February 3, 2014 10:02 AM

            Viva Pinata is a pretty fantastic game though. That one always seems to get overlooked, and I really wish they'd develop another game in the series.

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        February 3, 2014 2:37 PM

        final fantasy

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      February 3, 2014 8:13 AM

      Just drop the gamepad and sell the wii-u for $200 with Mario and a pro controller or wii remoteplus. Done.

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        February 3, 2014 8:30 AM

        No.

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        February 3, 2014 9:31 AM

        [deleted]

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          February 3, 2014 9:52 AM

          Weather the storm with Nintendo titles until they release their next console. The gamepad isn't being used to it's full potential anyways so just ditch it or at least offer the option to buy the console without it.

          http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-01-29-donkey-kong-country-tropical-freeze-lacks-gamepad-functionality

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            February 3, 2014 10:38 AM

            I like the Gamepad just because I can play away from the tv. They need to release VC games by the truckload that can be played on the pad, as well as making Wii games controllable with the thing (Touch controls instead of motion.)

            that said, it won't save it, but it will stop the bleeding. And they won't do anything like that anyway. What they'll do instead is push Mario Kart to May and start talking about entering a completely different market so they can lose money over there too.

            Iwata and the entire current leadership needs to GTFO.

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              February 3, 2014 2:50 PM

              My wife and I play new super Mario together. The gamepad is useless to us.

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                February 3, 2014 3:03 PM

                That specific decision in NSMBU is the most baffling design choice. I'm surprised it hasn't been patched yet. Silly to make a pack-in game not use your hardware in obviously beneficial ways.

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                  February 3, 2014 7:03 PM

                  It just reinforced the idea that you could still have fun w/o the tablet.

                  On a side note, I've always thought something like secret of mana with 3 tablets would be cool.

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          February 3, 2014 10:33 AM

          The point would be that it's cheaper, it has Nintendo games, and the games still look really good.

          The gamepad was a bad idea from the start. I think most games are better without it, even Rayman Legends would have been better if Ubisoft ditched the murphy idea and just increased the number of traditional levels instead. It can be a nice option for a select few games that could benefit from it, but for a lot of games it is shoehorned in and degrades the experience.

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        February 3, 2014 2:35 PM

        It's the best part of the system, get a clue.

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          February 3, 2014 2:59 PM

          The best part of the system is nintendo titles not the hardware.

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        February 3, 2014 2:51 PM

        Lol no. The gamepad is awesome.

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        February 3, 2014 6:41 PM

        The big problem with the touch screen pad is its a complete 180 from the wii controllers. But the wii controllers are still supported and so are the old fastion controllers.

        They went the motion controller direction last time they should have just stuck with it and improved it. You can't have your controller cake and eat it too.

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        February 3, 2014 7:14 PM

        [deleted]

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          February 9, 2014 1:35 PM

          Well some of us do still give a shit because every mario game is fun

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      February 3, 2014 8:36 AM

      a japanese video game company that is having performance problem has decided to resort to M&A as a way to solve said issues? color me shocked!

      That's almost as shocking as American video game publishers that shut down studios in response to the same.

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      February 3, 2014 8:53 AM

      [deleted]

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      February 3, 2014 9:07 AM

      Nintendo acquires Ouya, renames it Wiiouya, then discovers they have no market for it because Ouya owners are already playing all the Virtual Console titles on it via emulators. Then they somehow market it as a lifesaving device.

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      February 3, 2014 1:46 PM

      Buy Mega Man from Capcom and Castlevania from Konami and do crazy shit with those...that's my dream plan for Nintendo that won't happen ever.

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      February 3, 2014 1:48 PM

      [deleted]

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      February 3, 2014 2:57 PM

      They should have been doing this a long time ago. They should have snapped up Vigil Games in the THQ breakup.

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      February 3, 2014 7:25 PM

      maybe they can acquire the gaming division from Disney.

      http://www.cnbc.com/id/101386435

      they need software to sell their hardware, right?

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      February 3, 2014 9:08 PM

      Not saying that they should buy them out, but they should definitely consult Critical Studio with ideas or plans to release Dungeon Land on the Wii U. Call me crazy but that game is basically ideal for how the Wii U should be played.

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