Sekiryo Kaneda
金田 積良
2nd President of Nintendo
In office
1929–1949
Preceded byFusajiro Yamauchi
Succeeded byHiroshi Yamauchi
Personal details
Born1883
Died1949 (aged 65-66)
SpouseTei Yamauchi
RelativesHiroshi Yamauchi (grandson)
OccupationEntrepreneur

Sekiryo Kaneda (Japanese: 金田 積良, Hepburn: Kaneda Sekiryō, 1883 – 1949), also known as Sekiryo Yamauchi (山内 積良, Yamauchi Sekiryō), was the second president of what is now Nintendo Co., Ltd., from 1929 to 1949. He married the daughter of Fusajiro Yamauchi, Tei Yamauchi, and took the Yamauchi surname. Kaneda retired in 1949 after suffering a stroke, leaving Nintendo to be run by his grandson, Hiroshi Yamauchi.

Career

Kaneda married Fusajiro Yamauchi's daughter, Tei, and based on Japanese adult adoption rules, he took the Yamauchi surname on the same day in order to inherit Nintendo.[1] Fusajiro Yamauchi retired in 1929, making Kaneda Nintendo's second president.[2]

When Kaneda took over Nintendo, he was in charge of Japan's largest card maker.[2] In 1933, he established a joint venture company, and renamed it Yamauchi Nintendo and Co.[1] The same year, Kaneda built a new headquarters building.[3] In 1947, he established a distribution company, Marufuku Company Limited, that would carry Western-style playing cards.[1] During his tenure, Kaneda strove to make the company more driven and efficient—introducing an assembly line, creating a hierarchy of management that competed with each other on performance, and advancing the playing card business.[1][4]

He suffered a stroke in 1948 and retired in 1949.[5] Near death, he quickly recruited his 21-year-old grandson, Hiroshi Yamauchi, to quit college and inherit the family business. Hiroshi Yamauchi's father, Shikanojo Inaba, had forfeited inheritance because he had abandoned his family when Yamauchi was five years old.[6][7][8]

References

  1. ^ a b c d David Sheff (2 November 2011). Game Over: How Nintendo Conquered The World. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. pp. 31–32. ISBN 978-0-307-80074-9.
  2. ^ a b Adam Sutherland (15 January 2012). The Story of Nintendo. The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. p. 8. ISBN 978-1-4488-7043-1.
  3. ^ "The birthplace of Nintendo". GamesIndustry.biz. 2 May 2022. Retrieved 31 October 2022.
  4. ^ Mary Firestone (2011). Nintendo: The Company and Its Founders. ABDO. pp. 18–. ISBN 978-1-61714-809-5.
  5. ^ Harris, Blake J. (13 May 2014). Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, and the Battle that Defined a Generation. Dey Street Books. pp. 54–. ISBN 978-0-06-227671-1.
  6. ^ Pollack, Andrew (26 August 1996). "Seeking a Turnaround With Souped-Up Machines and a Few New Games". The New York Times. Retrieved 12 July 2019.
  7. ^ Schofield, Jack (19 September 2013). "Hiroshi Yamauchi obituary". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 9 July 2019.
  8. ^ Parkin, Simon (20 September 2013). "Postscript: The Man Behind Nintendo". The New Yorker. Retrieved 12 July 2019.
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