is a Japanese businessman who served as the 5th

president President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university * President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...

Nintendo is a Japanese multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. It develops video games and video game consoles. Nintendo was founded in 1889 as by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi and originally produced handmade playing cards ...

from September 2015 to June 2018. He was formerly the president of Nintendo of America from January 2002, succeeding

Minoru Arakawa is a Japanese businessman best known as the founder and former president of Nintendo of America, and the co-founder of Tetris Online, Inc. Biography Minoru Arakawa was born on 3 September 1946 in Kyoto, Japan, the second son of Waichiro Arakaw ...

, until Reggie Fils-Aimé took his place in May 2006. He was promoted to managing director in June 2013 and was named the fifth president of the company in September 2015, succeeding

Satoru Iwata was a Japanese businessman, video game programmer, video game designer, and producer. He was the fourth president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nintendo from 2002 until his death in 2015. He was a major contributor in broadening the app ...

, who died in July 2015. Kimishima stepped down as president in June 2018 and was succeeded by

Shuntaro Furukawa is a Japanese businessman and executive. He is the sixth and current president of the video game company Nintendo in Japan. He took over as company president in June 2018, succeeding Tatsumi Kimishima. Early life Furukawa was born in Tokyo, ...

Career

Sanwa Bank

Kimishima was born in

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.46 ...

. After graduating from

Hitotsubashi University is a national university located in Tokyo, Japan. It has campuses in Kunitachi, Kodaira, and Chiyoda. One of the top 9 Designated National University in Japan, Hitotsubashi is a relatively small institution specialized solely in social science ...

, he joined

Sanwa Bank was a major Japanese bank headquartered in Osaka, which operated from 1933 to 2002. It merged with Tokai Bank to form UFJ Bank (now part of MUFG Bank). In the 1990s, it was the most profitable bank in the world, and second-largest in terms of ass ...

in 1973, working there for 27 years. Kimishima dealt with corporate planning, international business development, corporate communications, and promotions. During his 27-year tenure at Sanwa Bank, Kimishima was posted in

New York, New York New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

;

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

; and

San Francisco, California San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

in the United States, and in

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

and the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean ...

Pokémon

Kimishima was approached by

Hiroshi Yamauchi was a Japanese businessman and the third president of Nintendo, joining the company in 1949 until stepping down on 24 May 2002, being subsequently succeeded by Satoru Iwata. During his 53-year tenure, Yamauchi transformed Nintendo from a hanafu ...

, who wanted someone outside of the video game industry to oversee the finances of an American subsidiary for the popular

Pokémon (an abbreviation for in Japan) is a Japanese media franchise managed by The Pokémon Company, founded by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures, the owners of the trademark and copyright of the franchise. In terms of what each of thos ...

franchise. Kimishima accepted the position, and was appointed

chief financial officer The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and fina ...

The Pokémon Company The Pokémon Company (株式会社ポケモン, '' Kabushiki gaisha Pokemon'') is a Japanese company responsible for brand management, production, publishing, marketing, and licensing of the ''Pokémon'' franchise, which consists of video ga ...

in December 2000. In 2001, Kimishima was appointed president of Pokémon USA Inc. During Kimishima's early time working there, a number of popular ''Pokémon'' games were released.

Nintendo

Yamauchi appointed Tatsumi Kimishima to become president of Nintendo of America in January 2002. He was previously working as the head of Nintendo's Pokémon division. Four years after Kimishima's promotion he was promoted again, but this time to the position of chief executive officer and chairman of the board.

President

On September 14, 2015, after the death of Iwata in July 2015, Kimishima was named company president of Nintendo.

Shigeru Miyamoto is a Japanese video game designer, producer and game director at Nintendo, where he serves as one of its representative directors. Widely regarded as one of the most accomplished and influential designers in the history of video games, he ...

and

Genyo Takeda is a retired Japanese game designer and executive who worked for the video game company Nintendo. Takeda was formerly the general manager of Nintendo's Integrated Research & Development division, and was the co-representative director and "Tech ...

were also put into senior advisory roles as "Creative Fellow" and "Technology Fellow", respectively. Kimishima described his desire to follow Iwata's general strategy, stating that "Takeda and Miyamoto will be in charge of software development, while I control administration". In May 2016, Kimishima announced that Nintendo were going to start their own film production, and that they were looking for filmmakers for their projects. As President of Nintendo, Kimishima also oversaw the launch of the

Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a tablet that can either be docked for use as a home console or used as a portable device, making it a ...

, and appeared in the 2017 Nintendo Switch Presentation. In April 2018, Nintendo announced that Kimishima would be stepping down as president on June 28, 2018, being succeeded by

. Kimishima remains at Nintendo as an Executive Adviser.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kimishima, Tatsumi 1950 births Living people Nintendo people Japanese chief executives Japanese chairpersons of corporations Businesspeople from Tokyo Hitotsubashi University alumni Japanese video game businesspeople