With New Japan Pro Wrestling’s next big show in the United States, the G1 Special in San Francisco, coming up this Saturday, the company’s reach outside of ‘The Land Of The Rising Sun’ could only continue to grow since the hiring of new President Harold Meij (check that story out here).

Meij has made his plans to keep expanding out clear (for more on that go here), a recent interview with Mainichi revealed an updated subscriber count for the company’s streaming service, NJPW World:

“My thinking hasn’t changed since my time at Takara Tomy. I want to expand the fanbase regardless of age, gender or nationality. New Japan has fantastic content, so it has the possibility of picking up popularity overseas. At the moment, there are some 100,000 registered members on our video streaming service ‘New Japan Pro-Wrestling World,’ and 40,000 of them live outside Japan. I would like to aim for the international market with things like videos in English or events for foreign tourists.”

Source: Mainichi

EA’s Take: As I usually do with anything Japan, I deferred to our expert Andrew Balaz who informed me that as of last May, NJPW World was only at 50,000 subscribers with twenty percent of that coming from outside of Japan (if you can’t do math, that 10,000). So New Japan has already been moving in the right direction with the total number doubling and now being comprised of forty percent from outside Japan. So while it’s not shocking they still have the majority, you have to like what Harold Meij has been saying since his his hiring in-terms of growing the business which is likely why he got the gig.

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