VShojo shuts down as CEO confirms $500k Ironmouse charity donation wasn’t paid

In the wake of Ironmouse calling out VShojo for failing to donate $500k to charity, several other VTubers working under the agency called them out for missing months worth of payments to them.

This resulted in a mass exodus, with all of VShojo’s talent cutting ties with the org within 24 hours of the news coming out. The collapse of this organization was rapid.

Now-former CEO Justin Ignacio confirmed that they ran out of money to pay out their talent months ago and failed to rally enough funds to right the ship. As a result, he’s opted to shutter the company entirely.

VShojo shuts down after talent went unpaid for months

“VShojo has failed, and I’ve mismanaged the company into the situation you’re all witnessing,” Ignacio’s statement opens. He’s taking “full responsibility” for the mismanagement of their talent and explained the steps that got them here.

“Over the past few years, we raised around $11 million to pursue a bold, talent-first approach in Tubing, prioritizing creators and community over short-term profits, to achieve long-term sustainability,” he explained.

“Our funding went directly to our creators through generous splits, debut investments, infrastructure, concerts, events, and staffing, all designed to support them. We also wanted talent to own their IP, which we knew was a unique creator-first approach for an agency. However, despite all our efforts, the business failed to generate the revenue we needed to sustain that model, and eventually, we ran out of money.”

He also directly admitted that the money invested was generated by the talent, meaning that the company was siphoning directly from money that would have gone toward the talent to keep the organization afloat.

“Some of the money spent by the company was raised in connection with talent activity, which I later learned was intended for a charitable initiative. At the time, we were working hard to raise additional investment capital to cover our costs, and I firmly believed, based on the information available to us, that we would be able to do so and cover all expenses. We were unsuccessful in our fundraising efforts.”

And, though he has shuttered the company in a final statement, there’s no plan of action to pay talent back or to send the promised $500k to the Immune Deficiency Foundation.