History
Namco Bandai Holdings was created in 2005, when Namco and Bandai performed a management integration, carried out via a share exchange. The shareholders of Namco received one NBHD share for each Namco share and the shareholders of Bandai received 1.5 NBHD shares for each Bandai share.
Prior to the merger, Bandai owned Sunrise, a Japanese animation company, which became a subsidiary of NBHD following the merger.
In September 2006, NBHD acquired CCP Co., Ltd. from Casio and made it a wholly owned subsidiary.
NBHD fully acquired developers Banpresto (whose video game operations were absorbed into Namco Bandai Games on April 1, 2008) and Namco Tales Studio since the merger. Formerly, both were partially owned by Bandai and Namco respectively. On March 31, 2006, Namco and Bandai's video game operations merged into Namco Bandai Games Inc. (NBGI). Namco's arcade and facility management continues under the name of Namco Ltd.
The business of Bandai Networks Co., Ltd. was merged into Namco Bandai Games, Inc. in April 2009 and Bandai Networks subsequently ceased to exist as a separate company.
Namco Bandai bought a 34% stake in Atari Europe on May 14, 2009, paving the way for its acquisition from Infogrames. Until June 30, 2012, Infogrames has the option to sell the other 66% in Atari Europe to NBHD. Between June 31, 2012 to June 20, 2013, Namco Bandai gains the option to acquire the 66% stake. On the 7th of July 2009, Namco Bandai Holdings bought 100% of Atari Australia Pty Ltd. NBHD acquired 100% of the shares of Atari Asia Holdings Pty. Ltd. and 100% of the shares of Atari UK Ltd. These former Atari companies were merged into Namco Bandai Partners to handle distribution and publishing support in PAL territories, including contracts for other publishers' titles.
Namco Bandai is pursuing whole ownership of D3 Publisher and currently owns 95% of the company's shares.
Namco Bandai has also created the ShiftyLook webcomic series in the US, which focuses on reviving Namco's classic game series as comic strips. Comic strip series include Bravoman, Sky Kid, Xevious, Alien Confidential, Rocket Fox, Scar (based on Genpei Toumaden), and many more.
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