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Gumi looks to go big outside of Japan, setting up 4 studios in US and Europe

Being born in the USA

Gumi looks to go big outside of Japan, setting up 4 studios in US and Europe

Ambitious Japanese publisher Gumi has announced it will open four new studios that will focus solely on making content for the North American and European market.

The Tokyo headquartered outfit plans to hire 100 new employees in order to address distribution demands and make its North American dream a reality.

Gumi's US development  headquarters will be in Austin, with three other studios being set up in Vancouver (Canada), Stockholm (Sweden), and Kiev (Ukraine).

An office will also be set up in San Francisco to help the company deal with business development and public relations.

Organic growth

In an attempt to ensure its grand vision becomes a reality, Gumi has brought in former WeMade, Microsoft, and Nintendo man, A.J. Redmer, to head up its North American operations.

Speaking out about Gumi's plan, Redmer explained that the firm has hit the nail on the head by looking to learn, adapt, and grow in foreign territories.

"The current success of Brave Frontier in the US market confirmed that we are able to compete in the west," explained Redmer.

"Operating the game in North America has provided us with tremendous insight and expertise about US mobile gamers that we will continue to leverage across additional titles we’re launching in this market.

"We’ve found that each market has unique tastes to their local cultures and playing styles and in order to develop games to the best of our ability, it’s important to have studios focused solely on development, monetisation, and operations for each market."

Gumi will use information gleaned from Brave Frontier's US release

Indeed, by honing in on new genres and attempting to integrate itself into local markets, Redmer believes Gumi will be able to harness the power of organic growth.

"We operate several studios worldwide and each studio is deeply integrated with their local market," added Redmer.

"Our new studios will focus on genres we think have been overlooked on mobile, and each studio will have its own organic and deep understanding of the markets in which they operate.

"Additionally, each studio will develop their own game operations technology, local marketing expertise, and other best practices for their specific market."

[source: TechCrunch]

What do you call someone who has an unhealthy obsession with video games and Sean Bean? That'd be a 'Chris Kerr'. Chris is one of those deluded souls who actually believes that one day Sean Bean will survive a movie. Poor guy.