COVER Corporation (Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan, CEO: Motoaki Tanigo) announced that it will be opening its inaugural overseas subsidiary COVER USA in North America. The main objective for opening their first location outside of Japan is aimed at localization efforts to facilitate global expansion.
COVER USA will uphold its mission "Together, Let’s Create Culture Loved by All" and is committed to expanding its talent group to English-speaking countries and Indonesia, engaging in VTuber business on a global scale. Given this context, COVER Corporation believes that to expand and promote "VTuber" culture globally, it is crucial to establish localized business environments, including tailored content provision and sales activities in each region. In the past year, COVER Corporation has begun to create awareness of the VTuber industry in these markets.
In 2023, COVER Corporation held the first-ever hololive production concert “hololive English 1st Concert -Connect the World-“ in North America, in addition to collaborating and partnering with international companies. hololive production also participated in 26 overseas events (from April 2023 to December 2023). Additionally, in August 2023, COVER Corporation’s VTuber, Gawr Gura was awarded VTuber Of The Year at the Streamy Awards, the largest content-creator focused award show in North America, COVER Corporation was also recently awarded the Runner-Up Award in the Project Category for CJPF Awards 2024, an initiative organized by the "Cool Japan Public-Private Partnership Platform" (Intellectual Property Strategy Headquarters, Cabinet Office of Japan). It aims to select and commend initiatives deemed suitable for the "Cool Japan Strategy" from a wide range of videos and projects that promote Japan's attractiveness overseas, and helps facilitate inbound expansion, with selections made by a judging committee.These activities have helped expand the recognition and awareness of VTuber activities.
"COVER Corporation is actively striving to promote the culture of Japan-made "VTubers" phenomenon worldwide. Last year, we participated in over 20 anime conventions and successfully held a large-scale live concert in North America. We are excited to announce the establishment of our first overseas office to further bring awareness to the VTuber culture in North America. Through our North American subsidiary, we aim to expand our local PR efforts and business operations. We look forward to collaborating with various local companies in the future and are excited about the opportunities ahead." commented Motoaki Tanigo, CEO of COVER Corporation.
Starting with COVER USA,COVER Corporation, will further deploy various measures to expand the local community and create new business opportunities on-site. Simultaneously, through the content IP of VTubers, they will collaborate to create a new field where virtual entertainment transcends borders and generations and creators from various genres around the world can thrive.
Establishing COVER USA
In recent years, the global entertainment market, including games, anime, and manga, has been expanding. The VTuber market, in particular, is expected to reach 80 billion yen1 in Japan in fiscal year 2023 and is predicted to grow significantly to approximately 25 trillion yen2 globally by 2028. Among these, the North American market has a strong foundation in entertainment culture with its own intellectual properties (IPs). Japanese character IPs with worldwide recognition have historically gained popularity and enthusiasm through North American media channels, further expanding through merchandising and licensing.
Given this background, COVER Corporation has decided to establish COVER USA in North America as the first step in accelerating global business and content expansion. We aim to elevate the "VTuber" culture into a Japanese-originated new content business that can compete alongside manga, anime, and games on a global scale.
For more information about COVER Corporation, visit https://cover-corp.com/en.
Source
*1 "Thorough Study of the 2023 VTuber Market: Market Research Edition" by Yano Economic Research Institute (https://www.yano.co.jp/press-release/show/press_id/3304)
*2 "Analysis of the World Market for VTubers (Virtual YouTubers) (2022)" Market Research Report by Global Information Co., Ltd. (https://www.gii.co.jp/report/qyr1206289-global-vtuber-virtual-youtuber-market-research.html)
