Language Giant NOVA Bites the Dust
Friday, October 26, 2007 Posted: 07:48 PM JST
As predicted in my article of October 10, Japan's largest chain of foreign language schools, NOVA Corp, filed for receivership today and closed all its schools.
NOVA's debts amount to JPY 43.9 billion (USD 384 million). This leaves some 400,000 students without the ability to get the lessons they paid for. Some lost as much as JPY 700,000 (USD 6,125). NOVA's 2,000 Japanese employees have not been paid since July, while about 4,000 non-Japanese employees have not been paid for October.
The company's fortunes went starkly downhill in June after a court ruled it had misled customers in advertisements and ordered the company to suspend part of its operations.
As the whereabouts of NOVA Corp. president Nozomu Sahashi remained a mystery, an increasing number of the company's top officials started to defect over the past week.
A trustee has been appointed by the court to sort out NOVA's debts and attempt to seek sponsors who are willing to rebuild the company's business.
Keywords: national_news
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