Biz Daily: What next for Nintendo in a post-Iwata world?

hello and welcome to Biz daily I'm John Jordan So today we're talking not so much about kind of a new story is more kind of a a kind of a a thought-provoking kind of trend pce I guess um so now we're a week on from the sad news that uh Nintendo CEO uh sat I surprisingly two lot of people um died so um people had known he he'd been here for a while so he canceled his um his E3 appointment and you know people inter had been kind of clear that he was having um kind of surgery and um but I think I think the shot came one because he was I'm relatively young 55 and two I don't think people really realized the kind of the severity of of his problems um and that's a difficult thing for for kind of companies to um kind of get

across to the public um I guess we've seen that with apple and Steve Jobs so there's a kind of a privacy issue obviously for the individual concerned um which is difficult to kind of handle when they're in a high-profile role in a company that lots of people kind of care about and I guess that's kind of partly where the shot came about last week um that it was just sudden it was was um people were not expecting um that to happen so quickly um but I guess there's been lots of talk about kind of his legacy and and and um that kind of stuff we not going to really kind of dwell on that but I guess it's kind of interesting to look at kind of where Nintendo finds itself now so um I mean in start financial terms which is not always the best way to look at things but uh certainly one way to look at things so um Mr iwat took over CEO of Nintendo in 2002 um and um if you compare the share price of Nintendo obviously a lot of things have gone on in the global economy since then the share price hasn't really moved it's gone it went massively up and then obviously the kind of financial crisis happen it might massively down so you

could argue some things outside Nintendo's control um but in that kind of broad scheme of things um Nintendo is kind of um finds itself or shareholders at least in Nintendo find themselves kind of kind of back where they were um they get it div now I suppose but um the share price hasn't moved up a lot in terms of Nintendo over that period of time obviously some massive successes and certainly something you know things that I water were involved with so the DS and the Wii both groundbreaking Hardware open up gameing much wider audience and could almost be seen as kind of precursors to where mobile gaming would take gaming as in everyone now is a gamer I mean certainly with the Wii that was something where people who didn't think they were Gamers so they were kind of bowling or playing tennis or all that kind of stuff obviously kind of on the on continuing on in Nintendo's kind of hierarchy um 3DS um I mean not unsuccessful but the 3D part of that um probably didn't need to be there and the Wii U are definitely unsuccessful

um and so kind of we find ourselves with Nintendo in kind of a bit of a kind of Crossroads really um they're clearly financially not in a not in a great place um they're not profitable the sales have been declining from the high points of of kind of we and Bs um and OB they've announced um after a long kind of period of thinking for my himself about mobile gam so the kind of the weird thing is he himself was actually quite into kind of kind of seemed like quite into mobile games he b b kind of Apple fan who very early user of the iPhone so it's not really clear that Nintendo's kind of adversion to Mobile gaming came from him personally or was kind of a board decision or it's very hard with Japanese companies is they tend to be very conservative in their nature and that often is kind of represented on the board level so unlike kind of American CEOs who kind of swash buckling like you know you do what I say kind of stuff Japanese companies very much more consensus and the CEO while being a figurehead doesn't necessarily have particularly kind of any more power

maybe even has less power the big head so it's not really clear why Nintendo has taken so long to get into Mobile gaming and we remind ourselves it's not actually Mobile gaming yet so it's it's announced it um partnership with GRE with DNA that's Freudian isn't it um it's announced it's going do five games with DNA but none of them out yet and there's not really any detail about what this games will be so it's very hard to judge whether that kind of process will be successful whether there just maybe too late in the market um and I guess when we look at now a um Nintendo that doesn't have a CEO and obviously there's the issue of who will take over and I think we all um kind of know that uh the kind of the I guess the the public favorite um kind of won't take over there's um you know there's when you're kind of running running a company um then you have to be kind of a be kind of a corporate kind of level so so kind of game design is um and guess kind of moto is the one who everyone kind wants to be CEO people have actually suggested he

might be one he's kind of semi-retired and two he's obvious a very creative guy but not probably wanting to be running a board and probably not very um not necessarily not good at numbers but not a corporate kind of number head um so we'll probably see um an internal uh kind of appointment I guess from someone maybe we don't know um but I guess there is an opportunity for Nintendo to CU it is making a radical step it's got this new hardware it's got the NX Hardware um which again we don't really know very much about that's seems like going to be much more open platform um kind of be a a gaming platform that can go on lots of different Hardware um or Lots Hardware can access it in different ways so perhaps there is an opportunity for Nintendo to um shck things up a bit maybe have maybe have an an outsider do necessarily need to be a kind of a western CEO um but potentially just could be an outsider to the company um but it seems like the the vision at least as articulated to us the the kind of public outside Nintendo very much

come came from kind of I water so I guess there's another opportunity is if someone else comes in does that Vision kind of remain the same um so I guess it's um you know from a Nintendo point of view I'm sure they would have been much happier if if if there wasn't this kind of uncertainty at at the top whether it is actually uncertainty whether it's just of us kind of journalistic License to say um there is there is um kind of uncertainty um but I think it's definitely the case that there is an opportunity There's an opportunity for Nintendo to kind of Point um someone new who will kind of uh maybe be a bit more enthusiastic towards mobile games or a bit more um maybe flexible in their approaches it's not really clear what intended approach will be I me I also had didn't like the term free to play he like the slightly comesy play fre to start just I'm not sure that would encourage people to play games more um and seemed very much more he was Keener on paid games anyway really um I think there's an opportunity there for someone to come in and maybe be bit more enthusiastic but equally you know

there's a a potential weakness there there's a potential you know hunkering down there's a potential to be more conservative in their business um which is probably um looking at how competitors are not the not you know the only competitors but how kind of Sony um Japanese company of been a lot more kind of westernized I guess than Nintendo over the years you know how that's looking to just expand it's not particularly mobile say exp M has not been particularly successful but at least it's had he had a go and now it's kind of got be are with morphus and PlayStation 4 is a big success um Microsoft again I mean we're not quite sure how core game is going to be to their long-term Vision but they're kind of um kind of uh and equally mobile has been a bit of disaster for for for Microsoft terms of where Nokia have gone but in terms of looking for the future it's got kind of the AR thing it's got the hollow lens whether that'll be an actual success or whether it's more technology demonstrated but Microsoft is kind of been reinvigorated under its new CEO so I think um there is a yeah an opportunity and a threat for for

Nintendo really to find its way in in a world that's that's kind of rapidly fragmenting in terms of gaming and and platforms and that's kind of been the soft spot for Nintendo that's always what it did so um we'll wait and see what happens there um but we kind of wish them all the best and we certainly enjoy everyone's hoping that the uh first Nintendo announced mobile game um will be a big one so I guess we'll wait and see later on in the year how that all plans out anyway come back tomorrow and we'll see what more news or we can talk about see you then