Bandai to Hire New American Univ. Grads for Head Office

Tokyo, Jan. 19 (Jiji Press)--Major Japanese toy maker Bandai Co.
has started directly recruiting new American university graduates, who will
work at its headquarters in Tokyo from this April, Jiji Press learned
Monday.
Bandai aims to boost its overseas operations by employing staff
familiar with local children's tastes, company officials said.
The company has recruited mid-career workers and intern students
from overseas before, but this is the first time that Bandai has hired new
non-Japanese graduates from universities abroad. Even at its overseas
subsidiaries, such cases are very rare.
Bandai started recruiting in Boston last June and informally
decided to hire four students who are fluent in Japanese, the officials
said.
The American graduates will be trained at the head office in Tokyo
for about three years and later transferred to overseas bases, including one
in the Untied States, to handle sales and product development, according to
the officials.
The company, under the wing of Namco Bandai Holdings Inc. <7832>,
plans to hire several such foreign graduates every year.
It aims to boost its overseas sales to account for 50 pct of its
total sales from the current 30 pct as the Japanese market is shrinking in
the face of country's falling birthrate and rapidly aging population.