[OTAKU]Sony Pictures TV is to become majority owner of Funimation

[Zen]

In a recent , Sony Pictures TV announced that they are set to the #1 English Language anime content provider in North America. (Crunchyroll has made great inroads in recent years, but they are still a streaming service. Funimation is the top producer of DVDs and BluRays, as well as the top licensor or anime films, such as the recent international hit, Your Name, which was released in the US by Funimation Films.) Given that a company the size of Sony is involved, the deal will need regulatory approval before it can be completed.

Sony Pictures TV already either runs or holds the majority stake in two Japanese Anime channels, "Animax" and "Kids Station", in addition to the streaming service "Crackle" which has a fairly large number of anime offerings. There is speculation that the "FunimationNow" streaming service may end up being merged with "Crackle" in the long run.

The announcement stated that the current CEO of Funimation will retain a minority stake in the company and remain with the company as CEO.

The real question about the deal is what happens to the recent, at the time groundbreaking deal, between Funimation and Crunchyroll. That deal, which involved Crunchyroll adding many of Funimation's older and simulcast subtitled titles to its catalog, Funimation providing simul-dub services for some of Crunchyroll's simulcast titles, and Funimation also providing physical distribution services for some Crunchyroll licensed titles, seemed to be a major step forward toward greater access to both fast-track dubbing for new titles and physical release for titles which previously would have been relegated to "streaming only". Industry insiders have commented that Sony is not known as a fan of consorting with the "enemy", which this deal certainly can be viewed as from a certain perspective, though if the Sony executives were truly wise, they would realize that this deal is one they need to honor and their real enemy is the "new kids on the block" when it comes to the "simulcast" game, Amazon and Netflix, though Netflix takes the "simul" out of "simulcast" on a regular basis by delaying release outside of Japan for most of the titles it licenses until after they have finished their run on Japanese TV. (They do simulcast them on Netflix Japan, however... the bastards.)

The other questions arising from the deal are whether the Sony people will leave the professional, "Anime Savvy" operations at Funimation in Texas intact, or try to consolidate some of their operations with other portions of the Sony corporation.

It should also be noted that Aniplex of America is a subsidiary of Aniplex, Inc., which is owned by Sony Music Entertainment Japan. Funimation noted in it's FAQ that the deal with Sony doesn't include Aniplex. Evidently Sony is rather renowned for being a company where the different divisions don't play well together unless they are forced to do so. However, the Sony Corporation's CFO Kenichiro Yoshida made the following comment: "We have IP across Funimation, Aniplex, Animax and the PlayStation platform, the challenge is to connect them all organically," Yoshida said. "CEO [Kaz] Hirai is taking stock of all the IP in the group and the PS4 will be at the center." ()

So, in the long run, it looks as if Sony may try to get all of their anime and game properties folded into one big, happy Playstation Network family. Hopefully they won't destroy the North American anime industry in the process...