Forum - View topicNEWS: Crunchyroll Co-Founder, Former CEO Kun Gao Launches AniBiz Platform for Anime Licensing
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Lord Geo
Posts: 3012 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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Home video is one of the categories that AniBiz is stating that it can assist licensees with (& even manga & light novels... somehow), so I wonder how long it'll take before someone actually takes a chance & tries to enter the anime home video industry via this platform.
At the same time, though, I'm not exactly shocked that two of the recommendations listed on AniBiz's site are from literal generative AI companies... |
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Kadmos1
 Posts: 13764 Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP |
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Well, Kun Gao has been involved with AI-related start-up companies. I wish he wasn't.
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chronium
 Posts: 317 Location: Canada |
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I wonder if this will improve how much old anime comes out of the wood work and shows up on streaming services.
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SinisterOracle
 SubscriberPosts: 887 |
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I’d love for more anime to see home video releases, so hopefully some company(ies) will take advantage and give this a try. Shame CR has become so stingy with it’s physical releases.
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Nipasu
 Posts: 183 |
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Interesting to see titles like Jewelpet and Magical Doremi listed when neither series are currently available for streaming in the US.
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Lord Geo
Posts: 3012 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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There are tons of unlicensed anime listed on AniBiz's website, because AniBiz's entire point is to help get licensees into contact with the partner Japanese licensors, of which ytv (Jewelpet) & Toei (Doremi) are two of them. Therefore, in theory, if a company was interested in licensing either of those shows for something like streaming then they could let AniBiz know, & AniBiz would then let the respective licensor know about the interest from the potential licensee.
It's not exactly a list of "these anime are necessarily available for licensing", but rather more of a "these anime are a part of the catalog of one of the partner licensors, so it's a title that AniBiz can potentially help get a licensing deal made for". Of course, AniBiz definitely looks to have just thrown entire catalogs into their list without any potential vetting done, as something like Heroman is listed, and it's known that Disney co-owns that IP, so who knows what could really be done with that title. There are also tons of titles in that list that don't have proper listing pages made, including some major titles like Cowboy Bebop, so it does look like AniBiz seemingly launched the site ASAP. |
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Greed1914
 Posts: 5383 |
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Best case scenario: we see an uptick in home video because businesses on both sides of the Pacific have to have awareness of what CR is leaving on the table.
But, I'm not going to expect much. The companies here, like Sentai for example, that are already in a position to do it don't need help with these connections. The problem is the 800 pound gorilla in the room that gets most everything anyway. The only real way to compete with that is with money, meaning Netflix and Amazon, which have no interest in home video because they want constant subscribers. That leaves either relatively tiny existing operations or outright startups who could use that to get a foot in the door. But, what may be a major problem there is that if, for example, CR licenses both streaming and physical rights that it doesn't use, there still might not be anything left. Outside of license rescues, we haven't seen anyone do like the odd Sentai bluray for a Netflix license when it comes to CR shows, so I suspect that they license everything they can even though they don't intend to use it. |
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YagamiBlackstone255
Posts: 472 |
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That's the whole point. For a new licensee to see "Oh! I wanna license that!" and then buy it. If anything its the already licensed anime that has me raising an eyebrow. |
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Lord Geo
Posts: 3012 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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It's because AniBiz wants to help licensees for more than just streaming & home video, which it categorizes as "Content". Each actual complete listing for an IP on the site provides the various categories that AniBiz wants to help with:
Apparel (T-shirts, Hoodies, Headwear, etc.) Accessories (Keychains, Lanyards, Pins, etc.) Home Goods (Mugs, Posters, Blankets, etc.) Stationery (Notebooks, Stickers, Pencil Case, etc.) Gaming (PC/Console/Mobile/Card Game) Experiential (Events, Concerts, Cafe collabs, etc.) Content (VOD, FAST, TV, etc.) Other Merchandise (Miscellaneous items, collectibles, etc.) We're long past the days where licensing an anime simply gives you EVERYTHING related to it, especially since that led to all sorts of complications later on (see: Tatsunoko vs. Capcom's international release hurdles), and instead licenses are much more piecemeal based on what the licensee actually intends to do with it. So even if a title is already licensed for "Content" purposes, it might still be available for stuff like "Apparel" or "Accessories" & companies that work in those fields could (again, in theory) use AniBiz to help get licenses for those specific purposes. |
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Greed1914
Posts: 5383 |
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Odds are that most of it will result in merch. I remember an ANNcast episode with Great Eastern, and the way they got the rights to do as much stuff as they did at the time is that companies, namely Funimation, licensed EVERYTHING when they picked up a new series. Funimation was not in the business of producing merch but had to take those rights as part of the bargain, but the guy running Great Eastern had connections to get manufacturing done elsewhere, so a sublicense ended up being mutually beneficial.
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