Today though, we bring you the sad news that Dejima Co., the publisher that debuted and published Comic Gumbo is now filing for bankruptcy. The following is a direct translation from animeanime.jp:
According to the Teikoku Databan, the large bankruptcy journal, on January 4th, Dejima Co. began the procedure of filing for bankruptcy at the Tokyo Region Court. The company applied to Tokyo District Court for voluntary bankruptcy on December 28th. The administration dealing with the bankruptcy is accepting credit reports until February 15th. The aggregate amount of the debt is thought to be about 200 million yen.
Last January (2007), Dejima Co. made headlines by launching Japan's first completely free weekly manga magazine, Comic Gumbo. Of all the free magazines available on the streets, a lot of them are computer-related. Going for manga instead of computers was thought to be a new business model.
However, ad revenues and tankoubon sales failed to rise while the costs of large-scale printing and distribution increased. The company announced suspension of the magazine on their website after releasing Issue 48 of Comic Gumbo on December 11th last year.
Having begun the bankruptcy procedure, Dejima will end the periodical magazine in less than a year.
Dejima's capital came from the combination of various companies, including Trans Cosmos, N.I.F SMBC ventures, the Orix and 160 million yen from Nippon Television Network, totaling up to a sum of 370 million yen.
