An ex-employee of Elden Ring publisher Bandai Namco has been arrested for embezzling a shocking ¥600 million over the course of seven years - all from selling 4,400 mobile devices.
Yesterday, May 14, Bandai Namco director Masaru Kawaguchi acknowledged in a statement that an ex-employee of the Japanese developer and publisher had been arrested on suspicion of corporate embezzlement. The individual isn't named, but it's revealed that between April 2015 and April 2022, they sold 4,400 mobile devices that were owned by Bandai Namco.
Without Bandai Namco's explicit permission, the ex-employee then sold all of these 4,400 mobile devices over the course of the seven years, and netted around ¥600 million (just under $4 million) as a result. You probably won't be surprised to hear that Bandai Namco had filed civil proceedings in a company court last year in January 2023, seeking ¥600 million in damages.
Later that same year in November, a judgment was finalized in favor of Bandai Namco, meaning the company had effectively won the civil proceedings against its former employee. Bandai Namco then filed a formal complaint against the former employee to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police, which is what has lead to the individual's arrest yesterday.
"We will implement measures (review and improve our business processes, strengthen our internal control systems, etc.) in cooperation with outside experts to prevent recurrence of such an incident, and work together as a group to prevent recurrence," Bandai Namco president Kawaguchi adds further along in the statement.
The matter isn't going to impact Bandai Namco's consolidated earnings report for the current fiscal year ending March 2025. Bandai Namco's president writes that the matter will have an "immaterial" impact on the company's next fiscal earnings report, when it's eventually published next year.
