For our Group to continue to deliver growth, we remain engaged in the following initiatives: 1) Digital Sales Enhancement; 2) Multiplatform Utilization; 3) Geographic Expansion; and 4) Game as a Service, Game as Media.
Geographic Expansion
In the context of Geographic Expansion, we have highlighted the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Latin America, and India as key strategic regions. Amongst these regions, we especially intend to position India as a region for focused investment starting this fiscal year. India’s telecommunications infrastructure has developed in recent years, and advances in fintech have given rise to more payment methods. As such, we believe the market is reaching the point that it can at last support the development of a robust gaming business. For this reason, we will be ramping up our investment in India. The Middle East is also very promising. We see it as an extremely attractive market when viewed broadly as the Arabic-speaking world rather than looking at it country by country. We intend to invest in the region not only via the localization and culturalization of our games, but also by supporting local developers or otherwise seeking opportunities to discover new talent.
Game as a Service, Game as Media
E-sports are a major topic of discussion in Japan of late. The focus tends to be on their business potential as a draw for spectators; however, rather than focusing exclusively on that side of e-sports, we hope instead to build excitement around them via initiatives designed to support the player community that makes them a viable spectator event to begin with. The concept of “Game as a Service” became the subject of significant debate in the fiscal year ended March 2018 due to its association with the loot box controversy. We see “Game as a Service” as a type of game design capable of enhancing the user’s entertainment experience and as a key concept in shaping the way e-sports and other gaming will look in the future. Similarly, we believe “Game as Media” is best considered in the context of the overall trend of games evolving into services. The world we find ourselves in demands that we think of new business models that recognize the media value of games by establishing streaming and viewing as ways of enjoying games in addition to actual game play.