A board member of Nintendo and The Pokemon Company, Shuntaro Furukawa, 46, will step up to the role of Nintendo’s new president in June following the retirement of Tatsumi Kimishima.
Furukawa will be only the sixth Nintendo president in the company’s history, which is quite remarkable considering the shuffling hierarchies of most big businesses.
The Yamauchi family, who founded the company, steered the ship for many years until the responsibility was passed onto the legendary Satoru Iwata, who sadly passed away in 2015.
Tatsumi Kimishima stepped up following the tragedy and has successfully returned the company back to stability following the failure of the Wii U. Kimishima’s legacy will include overseeing the release of the Switch (Iwata is recognised for the conception and early production of the console) as well as securing many profitable partnerships for the company.
At 46, Furukawa is comparatively young to be the president of a Japanese corporation, but Iwata was in his early forties when he took the role. It’s too soon to tell in which direction he will be guiding the company, but if he finally announces a localisation for Mother 3 then he will be pretty much beloved.
In other news, Nintendo of Europe boss Satoru Shibata is stepping back into a senior role behind-the-scenes. His successor has yet to be announced.
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