Following some pretty miserable financial results, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has said he will take a 50% cut to his salary. For at least the next five months, Iwata will take home half as much money as usual, and other prominent executive staff will see pay reductions as well. Shigeru Miyamoto and Genyo Takeda, will take a 30% pay cut, while other board members will take a 20% pay cut.
The cuts will stay in place until June, when the board will see if it deserves to go back to normal. That will depend not so much on a turnaround in the Wii U’s fortunes – which won’t really be evident until nearer Christmas – but in how Nintendo presents itself to investors and convinces them it has a new plan for turning themselves around.
The struggling Japanese gaming firm revealed profits slumped 30 per cent in the nine months to December, falling to 10.2 billion yen (£60 million).
Nintendo also warned it expects sales to “decrease significantly” in the current quarter as Christmas sales end.
The Super Mario Brothers and Donkey Kong creator has been weighed down by weaker-than-expected sales of its Wii U console, launched at the end of 2012.
Nintendo will be holding a big corporate meeting tomorrow to outline and plan its new business strategy.
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