Yasushi Akimoto-Produced Idol Unit 22/7 Gets Anime Project

22/7, the new "dimension-crossing" idol group that AKB48 founder and producer Yasushi Akimoto is producing, announced at their first live event on Saturday that the group is getting an anime project.

The group's official YouTube channel also posted a lyric video for their song "Boku wa Sonzai Shiteinakatta," but the video is region-locked to Japan only. The unit's debut single with the song will ship on September 20.

During the live event on Saturday, the group performed on stage as themselves, but also put on a motion capture performance as their anime characters.

The group based on the concept of "idols who cross dimensions" has eight anime idol characters, with their respective voice actresses performing as idols in the real world. A different character designer is handling each member's anime design. Sony Music Records and Aniplex received 10,325 applications for the idol group and held five rounds of auditions.

The cast members are as follows:

• Chiharu Hokaze as Reika Satō, 17 years old. She is the student council president and an honor student.
  
• Ruri Umino as Jun Toda, 16 years old. She acts high class and is a tsundere.
  
• Sally Amaki as Sakura Fujima, 17 years old. She is the daughter of a good family.
  
• Kanae Shirosawa as Akane Maruyama, 17 years old and cool.
  
• Mizuha Kuraoka as Miyako Kōno, 15 years old. She is egotistical and speaks in a Kansai dialect.
  
• Mei Hanakawa as Nicole Saitō, 17 years old and an idol.
  
• Nagomi Saijō as Miu Takigawa, 16 years old. She is an otaku and is a bit ignorant.
  
• Reina Miyase as Ayaka Tachikawa, 16 years old. She is aggressive and militant.

In addition, the website lists three additional cast members without roles: Aina Takeda, Urara Takatsuji, and Moe Suzuhana.

Akimoto founded the AKB48 idol group in 2005, with its sixth and latest domestic sister group, STU48, launchingthis summer. Akimoto also founded AKB48's "official rival group" Nogizaka46.