Who said outsourcing wasn’t an international business strategy? Koei (based in Japan) is going to be setting up a branch in Vietnam, for all the logical reasons that any company would outsource: lower costs and culture familiarities. Wait.. culture what?

Koei approved the building and opening of a subsidary in Hanoi, Vietnam yesterday (sort of today, they’re 14 hours ahead so it was August 4 there). The purpose of the branch is to “improve profitability” and “further growth and developement of the company.”

Their main reasons for opening a subsidary in an overall cheaper country makes sense, and so does their secondary reason: young Vietnamese are familiar with anime and Japanese culture.

While is true to an extent, Koei’s Dynasty Warriors and Romance of the Three Kingdoms video game series might be the true reason they chose Vietnam. The country is second only to China in Romance of the Three Kingdoms familiarity, which is an ancient Chinese story that has been told and retold so many times in moves, television  shows, and video games that most know it by heart.

They’re fantastic books, by the way.

Will Koei outsource Dynasty Warriors to Vietnam? Maybe. If they did would there be a new twist to the series? We can hope.