the competition was further reorganised in 2016 with a permanent sixth team from south africa and new entries based in argentina (jaguares) and japan (sunwolves). at that time, the competition was split into australasian and african groups (with the latter including the argentine and japanese teams), each in turn being divided into two conferences. all of the new zealand teams formed one conference. the finals series expanded to eight teams, with the top team from each conference, plus the top three non-winners from the australasian group and the top non-winner from the african group, qualifying.