Sega reviewing internal affairs

TOKYO--Back in April, Sega was at the center of a fatal accident involving the death of a handicapped man who fell out of a ride at the company's Joypolis amusement park in Tokyo. That incident may have been preventable, had Sega kept a better eye on its overall operations. Now, its parent company is taking action to avoid any further tragedies.

Sega Sammy Holdings announced on Monday that it has launched a new advisory committee that will look over its company's internal operations. The committee will consist of four core members who work outside of Sega and Sammy: Yoshio Ichiryu (CEO of consultant company Ichiryu Associates), Masaru Murai (consultant to General Atlantic Partners), Shinji Fukukawa (consultant to Dentsu Communications), and Junya Sato (lawyer). Sega Sammy Holdings will heed the advice given by the committee to further strengthen its corporate governance and make sure that incidents such as the Joypolis accident never happen again.

"Since our merger on October 2004, we have recognized the strengthening of our corporate governance and compliance as our top priority. Our establishment of this advisory committee is one of our ongoing efforts to strengthen our governance. With the supervision and advice from experts outside of our company, we hope to further improve on the health of our group's businesses," commented representatives from Sega Sammy Holdings.

"Our group has recently had issues, such as the accident at Sega's Tokyo Joypolis, and the tax-evasion allegations of Sammy's former president. In addition to our own [planned] internal measures, we hope to reflect the various opinions by the advisory committee to our group operation, in order to prevent these issues from happening again, and further strengthen our overall corporate governance."