Namco Ltd. (株式会社ナムコ Kabushiki-gaisha Namuko), an abbreviated form of "Nakamura Manufacturing Company", is an entertainment company based in Tokyo, Japan. They are best known for video games development and were founded on June 1, 1955.
On September 29, 2005, Namco officially merged with Japanese toy making company Bandai in order to form Namco Bandai Holdings Inc (NBHD), one of the largest entertainment companies in Japan. Namco became a wholly-owned subsidiary of the holding company. Although officially the merger was absorption, "Under the holding company, Namco, Bandai and other affiliated companies will mutually cooperate and contribute to the growth of the whole group based on their respective business strategies.".
Under the holding company, on March 31, 2006, Namco merged with Bandai's video game operations and was renamed Namco Bandai Games Inc. (NBGI), which is also the head of NBHD's Game Contents Strategic Business Unit (SBU). The company was internationally renamed as Bandai Namco Games in January of 2014, and later Bandai Namco Entertainment Inc. (BNEI) in April of 2015.
Namco Ltd.'s arcade venue, theme park and exploratory businesses, as well as the Namco Ltd. corporate name and logo, were spun off to create a new sister company. It is the head of NBHD's Amusement SBU.
Since their founding, Namco has produced many famous gaming franchises, including Tekken, Pac-Man, the Soul series, and Urban Reign.