2022 is the year of game acquisitions, and it continues today, with Nintendo spending 5,000,000,000 yen (about US$40 million) to acquire… a large piece of land.
The company announced that it was buying the land adjacent to its headquarters in Kyoto, Japan. The land was previously owned by the city and was where the foundation’s former support factor and materials and disaster prevention center were located.
The site is located at 11-2-5 Hokotate-cho, Kamitoba, Minami-ku, Kyoto, Japan, and measures 10,028.55㎡.
Nintendo will use the land to create a second headquarters development center. It is tentatively named the Headquarters Development Center, Building 2. It will be used in part for “strengthening R&D,” Nintendo said. The floor area of the building will be approximately 38,000 m² and it will be a 12-storey steel frame building with a height of approximately 72 m.
Nintendo plans to open the Headquarters Development Center, Building 2 in December 2027.
“Along with R&D investments and capital investments, Nintendo believes the acquisition and use of this land will play an important role in strengthening its R&D,” the company said.
Technically speaking, this is just Nintendo’s latest big acquisition. Earlier this year, the company bought its longtime collaborator, SRD Co. Ltd, which had worked with Nintendo for almost 40 years. In 2021, Nintendo bought another longtime collaborator, Next Level Games, creators of the Mario Strikers series which is now gearing up to release Mario Strikers: Battle League in June.