Last September, Yahoo Japan (4689), the country’s biggest online company, caused a splash when it announced it will enter the smartphone gaming business.
And today, in the wake of its FY2014 3Q financial results briefing, Yahoo Japan said the company was officially established on January 16 and is currently staffed with 31 people working in Tokyo’s Minato ward.
Dubbed Gamebank Corp., the venture was jointly set up with Tokyo-based VC Incubate Fund, which previously backed game startups like Axel Mark (3624) or Pokelabo (acquired by GREE (3632)).
Yahoo Japan says that:
- Gamebank will aim at releasing about one app per month from April this year
- the goal is to hire additional 50 employees to speed up development
- Gamebank will both develop and publish games
- selected games from non-Japanese developers will be localized and published as well
- the primary target group will be core players
- all games will be offered free-to-play
- Yahoo Japan will use its massive presence in the country’s Internet to promote Gamebank apps
Gamebank will be headed by Yasuhisa Tsubata who joined Yahoo Japan in 2012 after the company bought his startup. The “games” page on the website is still blank but that should change pretty soon.
