i agree nintendo is lagging behind with their digital services

Well going all digital are the publishers wettest dream. The sooner the better for them. With Nintendo going all digital would probably make their dreams come through faster. Cant really think of many other that would have more impact except for Sony. But they would follow suit pretty quickly after Nintendo Im guessing.

This is enough money to get them a seat at the table which can be important in itself.

The best case scenario is that they realize they are incompatible with Nintendo's vision and they sell off their shares at some point.  The worst case scenario is that Furukawa actually listens to them.  Nintendo's strength is not in digital or online anything.  Nintendo's strengths are 1) making games, 2) making hardware to specifically play games (like the Wii remote), and 3) local multiplayer.

I don't have a sense for Furukawa yet, but he has made mention of expanding into online and mobile gaming more, which is troubling.  But I won't really have a good sense about him until their next console is announced.  That is when we'll see the direction he really wants for the company.  He inherited the CEO position after the Switch already launched, so he is excuting someone else's vision at the moment (Iwata's).  But when we see the next system, then we'll know if any of this digital focus has taken hold.

Sounds like a whole lotta nothin. Lot of money dropped something that will just continue to their own thing.

the best big step Nintendo could take at the moment would be to create a Switch smartphone

wouldn't look too different on the outside, just an Android or whatever smartphone mode, with Google or Nintendo's digital services, music streaming etc...

imagine the sales and the exposure a real gaming smartphone could get, and I think it's the right timing too, smartphone technology is cheaper and is not moving fast at all the last few years, why carry two devices around

This is *very* bad news. Activist investors are very focussed on making money, over the long term profitability of an organisation. The main purpose is to heavily cut costs to boost the balance sheet, and then take out very large loans, before returning money to the investors. Then they cash out and leave the company with greatly increased debt.

They will say a lot of things that "sound good", but the only purpose is to jack up the stock price.

It makes sense for a clothing or oil company, but is bad for people in an creative industry.

Would we be able to make phone calls with it without an additional device?

2% is nothing to force anything on Nintendo, you are rigth Rol.

Why not see it as potentially positive? Since how long we all rant about Nintendo is being old and stubborn, is not innovating structurally, is not moving forward fast enough with certain technologies and businesses (online service, smart phone business, anyone?)? Such an investor could really bring in new ideas/moving things forward. I personally think that Mr. Furukawa is very smart, he's of a younger generation and he knows all the (old) shortcomings of Nintendo. I truly think he wants that Nintendo becomes an overall better company, a newer company (but not a hipster company). He knows that changes can only come if he listen to outsiders that's why is willing to listen to ValueAct. I think it's smart.

Personally, I wish Nintendo would start an adult brand (of course they have to name it differently) for games with adult content. I know, Nintendo doesn't like blood, violence and war themes but there are so much more adult themes. I also know that Nintendo's current in-house developers neither have the desire nor the skill to make such games with great quality but Nintendo has so much money, they should buy studios or build up new ones from the ground up for the development of such adult games. For me it's just silly to have a situation that if you are an adult gamer you have no choice than to also buy a PlayStation, Xbox or a gaming PC. As much as you love Nintendo, certain content you can't have on it (or just in limited quantity and quality). Nintendo always comes with the excuse that their games appeal to everyone including (young) adults. Yes, Mario Kart, Smash and even Mario Party are great party games where even (young) adults can have great fun with friends but ultimately, Nintendo says to such people: "Thank you for buying Nintendo products but for you to become fully satisfied, we are sorry, but you have to buy a either a PlayStation, Xbox or gaming PC."

LoL