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MAPPA Opens New Studio in Sendai in Spring 2018
posted on by Crystalyn Hodgkins
Studio MAPPA producer and CEO Manabu Ohtsuka along with Sendai City mayor Emiko Okuyama announced on Thursday that MAPPA plans to open a new studio in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture in spring 2018. The studio will be the first regional studio for MAPPA. The compan is headquartered in Tokyo.
MAPPA also began accepting job applications for the new studio for animators and touch-up animators who will graduate from college next year.
Former Madhouse producer Masao Maruyama (who is from Miyagi Prefecture) founded MAPPA in June 2011. The studio has been the main animation studio for such anime as Kids on the Slope, Terror in Resonance, Yuri!!! on Ice, Rage of Bahamut Genesis, Garo the Animation, DAYS, the first three seasons of the Teekyū anime, and In This Corner of the World. Maruyama stepped down as CEO in April 2016 and founded his new Studio M2 in the same year.
This year MAPPA is animated the Idol Incidents anime, and is working on the ongoing Rage of Bahamut: Virgin Soul anime. Upcoming works include Kakegurui and Altair: A Record of Battles (Shōkoku no Altair) in July, and Inuyashiki in October.
Miyagi Prefecture in the Tōhoku region of Japan was one of three prefectures most affected by the earthquake/tsunami/nuclear disaster in March 2011. The city of Sendai last year launched a plan to attract business in the digital contents industry to the area. Sendai is home to a vocational school for animation and computer graphics, and it grants subsidies to secure graduates a place to work in the area.
Sources: The Asahi Shimbun (Hideaki Ishibashi), Animation Business Journal (Tadashi Sudo) via Otakomu
