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Minoru Arakawa

 
Minoru Arakawa

 
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Minoru Arakawa
 
 
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(born September 3, 1946) was the president of Nintendo
Nintendo

is a global company located in Kyoto, Japan founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi to produce handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
 of America
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 (NOA) from 1980 to 2002.

Born in Kyoto
Kyoto

Sorry, no overview for this topic
, Japan
Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south....
, he attended Kyoto University
Kyoto University

, or is a major Japanese national university in Kyoto, Japan. It is the second oldest university in Japan, and formerly one of the Imperial university of Japan....
 and MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private university research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Massachusetts, United States....
. In 1972, he was hired by Japanese conglomerate Marubeni
Marubeni

is a Japanese trading company, one of the largest general trading companies in Japan....
 as part of their international staff, with the responsibility of helping to develop hotels, offices and condominiums overseas. He married the daughter of Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi
Hiroshi Yamauchi

is a Japanese people businessman. He was the third president of Nintendo, beginning in 1949 until stepping down on May 31, 2002. Yamauchi is credited with transforming Nintendo from a small hanafuda card-making company in Japan to a multi-billion dollar video game company, as it currently is....
, Yoko Yamauchi but continued to work for Marubeni.






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(born September 3, 1946) was the president of Nintendo
Nintendo

is a global company located in Kyoto, Japan founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi to produce handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
 of America
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 (NOA) from 1980 to 2002.

Born in Kyoto
Kyoto

Sorry, no overview for this topic
, Japan
Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south....
, he attended Kyoto University
Kyoto University

, or is a major Japanese national university in Kyoto, Japan. It is the second oldest university in Japan, and formerly one of the Imperial university of Japan....
 and MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private university research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Massachusetts, United States....
. In 1972, he was hired by Japanese conglomerate Marubeni
Marubeni

is a Japanese trading company, one of the largest general trading companies in Japan....
 as part of their international staff, with the responsibility of helping to develop hotels, offices and condominiums overseas. He married the daughter of Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi
Hiroshi Yamauchi

is a Japanese people businessman. He was the third president of Nintendo, beginning in 1949 until stepping down on May 31, 2002. Yamauchi is credited with transforming Nintendo from a small hanafuda card-making company in Japan to a multi-billion dollar video game company, as it currently is....
, Yoko Yamauchi but continued to work for Marubeni. He moved to Vancouver
Vancouver

Vancouver is a coastal city and major seaport located in the Lower Mainland of southwestern British Columbia, Canada. It is the largest city in British Columbia and the second largest metropolitan area in the Pacific Northwest region....
, and Yoko joined him there.

Arakawa impressed Hiroshi with the business acumen he displayed in his Marubeni Vancouver real estate projects. Hiroshi invited him to run a Nintendo production plant in Malaysia in 1979. Arakawa turned down that offer.

Hiroshi approached Arakawa again a year later with another offer: to establish Nintendo of America, an offer which he accepted. The company was founded in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
 in 1980, and he became its first president. After a disastrous experience with the Radar Scope
Radar Scope

is an early arcade game developed and published by Nintendo in November, 1980. Some sourcesrary to popular belief, it was not Nintendo's first arcade game....
 arcade game, he rebounded by converting the poorly received Radar Scope to the phenomenally successful Donkey Kong
Donkey Kong (video game)

is an arcade game developed by Nintendo, released in . It is an early example of the Platform game genre, as the gameplay focuses on maneuvering the main character across a series of platforms while dodging obstacles....
, which has had many sequels.

Starting in 1985, he and Howard Lincoln
Howard Lincoln

Howard Charles Lincoln is an United States lawyer and businessman, known primarily for being the former chairman of Nintendo and the current Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Seattle Mariners baseball team, representing absentee majority owner Hiroshi Yamauchi....
 were instrumental in rebuilding the video game industry (after the crash of 1983
Video game crash of 1983

The North American video game crash of 1983 was the Stock market crash of the US video game market in the early 1980s. It almost destroyed the then-fledgling industry and led to the bankruptcy of several companies producing home computers and video game consoles in North America....
) with the Nintendo Entertainment System
Nintendo Entertainment System

The Nintendo Entertainment System is an 8-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America, Europe and Australia in . In most of Asia, including Japan , the Philippines, China, Vietnam and Singapore, it was released as the ....
. Arakawa also hired Howard Philips
Howard Philips

Howard Phillips was an early employee of Nintendo of America. He was especially known for his red bow tie, red hair and freckles and acted as a spokesman for Nintendo....
, who would be invaluable to the creation of Nintendo Power
Nintendo Power

Nintendo Power magazine is a monthly news and strategy magazine formerly published in-house by Nintendo. As of issue #222 , Nintendo contracted publishing duties to Future US....
 magazine.

In 2002, after 22 years at the helm of NOA, Arakawa retired. Tatsumi Kimishima
Tatsumi Kimishima

is the CEO and Chairman of Nintendo of America. He was the president of Nintendo of America from January 2002 until May 2006, when Reggie Fils-Aime took his place....
, former chief financial officer
Chief financial officer

The chief financial officer of a Types of companies or public agency is the corporate officer primarily responsible for managing the Finance risks of the business or agency....
 of Nintendo's Pokémon
Pokémon

is a media franchise owned by the video game company Nintendo and created by Satoshi Tajiri around 1995. Originally released as a pair of interlinkable Game Boy line Console role-playing game video games, Pok?mon has since become the second most successful and lucrative video game-based media franchise in the world, behind only Nintendo's own...
 subsidiary, stepped up to take his place. Arakawa won a lifetime achievement award in February 2007 at the Interactive Achievement Awards
Interactive Achievement Awards

The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences has been hosting the Interactive Achievement Awards for video game publication annually since 1998. The game award ceremony is presented at the annual D.I.C.E....
.