Announced just prior to the trading floor bell yesterday morning, the announcement went out that two of the largest entertainment players in the industry are merging. The Walt Disney Company is offering $4 billion in stock and cash for the ownership rights of Marvel. As boards of both firms have signed off on the deal, this was clearly a non-hostile take over, and the deal is now in the hands of shareholders and federal regulators.
To this end, Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, and Goofy just inherited over 5,000+ iconic Marvel characters as siblings. Marvel continues to crank out comic books, and license these IP’s out for multimedia usage. Some of these licensees include THQ, Sega and Activision, and perhaps most importantly, Gazillion’s upcoming Marvel Universe MMO, a 10-year licensing deal.
So what does this merger mean for the heavily licensing dependant video game industry? While Disney has been ramping up in-house game development, according to an investors call, Disney’s CEO Bob Iger doesn’t see the need to take over all future Marvel based game development. “On the video game front, (Marvel) have some smart licensing agreements with some of the best video game manufacturers in the business. While we have been steadily moving in the direction of video game integration, we don’t rule out the blend of licensing and self-produced and distributed video games.”
This statement in itself demonstrates that Disney has just added another notch in their “we’re sitting pretty in the video game industry” belt, but it’s Iger’s caveat to this statement that closes the deal, “As these licensing deals expire we have the luxury of considering what’s best for the company and the products.” In other words, once the agreements are up, Disney can do whatever they want/makes the most financial sense. These deals, however, are quite a ways off. Marvel’s deal with Activision, which includes the Wolverine and Marvel Ultimate Alliance games expires in 2017. As mentioned above, 2019 will see the end of Gazillion Entertainment’s deal with Marvel. Marvel’s signed papers with Sega includes a games deal based on the Marvel movies, and was described only as “multi-year”. Likewise, THQ’s Marvel deal includes video games based on the Super Hero Squad franchise.
If Disney’s Club Penguin is to be used as any sort of yardstick, it’s fair to say that a Marvel based virtual world must certainly be on the big Mouse’s mind. Officially, and obviously too soon to start making any type of announcements, Disney hasn’t pointed to any original creations involving their new character acquisitions. However, according to the New York Times, the company does see immediate leveraging opportunities through the Marvel name; Characters such as Spider Man, X-men, Iron Man, and Captain America will be added to Disney theme parks as soon as feasible. Likewise, consumer products, i.e. toys, merchandising, etc., will be significantly factored into Disney’s international business plans.
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