A recent job posting from The Pokémon Company International has fans worried that the company is looking to dip its toes into the world of NFTs and blockchain technology.
Specifically, TPCi has posted that it’s looking for a “Corporate Development Principal” to work within the President and Corporate Development Office – a small, specialized group that’s currently under development.
The role’s description calls for three key responsibilities in Corporate Strategy, Pokémon Group Company Relations and Corporate Development and Innovation with the goal to design and build “an internal idea-sourcing platform to gather and assess TPCi employees’ innovative ideas to introduce brand new Pokémon experiences (products and experiences) to the world.”
The portion of the PD that’s of most interest is, of course, the mention of NFTs in the section calling for specific experience in applicants. Outside of the usual “minimum X years in this and that” and corporate fluff, two points in particular stand out as the specifically call out the kinds of tech buzzwords that can easily set alarm bells ringing:
- Deep knowledge and understanding of Web 3, including blockchain technologies and NFT, and/or metaverse.
- Deeply connected to a network of investors and entrepreneurs in the technology sectors above (Web3 and metaverse).
Given that everything else in this position’s description reads like The Pokémon Company is looking for candidates to research and execute new initiatives within the world of Pokémon, reading that above makes it pretty easy to assume that NFTs form at least part of that potential strategy. Whether it’s fully digital goods, NFT-enabled Pokémon TCG cards, blockchain-based games, a full-on Pokémon metaverse project or something in-between there’s obviously a ton of room in the space for something with the “catch ’em all” attitude of the franchise.
Who knows, perhaps they were inspired by that unauthorised Aussie Pokémon NFT game?
