Strong sales of Tekken 6 could not keep the company's profits in the black.
Namco Bandai released an extremely dismal third quarter financial report that reveals huge losses for the company during the past year. On a whole, the company that created Pac-Man posted a loss of $129 million (¥11.7 billion) during the last nine months of 2009.
During Namco Bandai's third quarter, net sales fell 10.4% to ¥282 billion ($3.11 billion), while operating income dropped a perilous 76.3% from ¥19.84 billion to ¥4.7 billion ($51.84 million).
In the financial report, Namco Bandai claimed that the sales of their video game software did not meet their projections because of terrible market conditions.
“In the Game Contents business in particular, sales fell below projections given weak market conditions for most of major home game software titles except Tekken 6, the largest title released in the current fiscal year, leading to weak results for the segment," the company said.
In response to the immense losses and the "severe business climate," Namco Bandai will begin a "group restart plan" that intends to reduce the company's current work force of around 7,000 by about 630 people. Namco Bandai will accomplish most of the work force reduction by offering voluntary retirement to select employees.
For the entire fiscal year (April 2009 through March 2010), Namco Bandai projects that the total loss for the company will be ¥31 billion ($341.93 million).
