Daijo Kudo, Chief Anime Officer near Kadokawa, recently critically critically commented on the changed power dynamics of the anime streamer in the west. We summarize.
Missing competition
According to Kudo, the US dominance of Crunchyroll, due to its fusion with funimation and the steadily decreasing influence of HIDIVE, led to selling anime sales rights.
Due to the lack of competition, Crunchyroll is currently the only large buyer of anime, which is why negotiations would also take much more time to achieve satisfactory results. This leads to increasing uncertainty among many companies that rely on international sales.
Because if Crunchyroll does not acquire the licenses, quite a few companies in the anime industry have very big problems-and the streaming service also knows that, which of course suits him very much in the corresponding negotiations.
Careful planning
Thanks to the strategic capital and business alliance with Sony close relationships with Crunchyroll and Aniplex (both part of the Sony Group), the strategic capital and business alliance cannot rely on a licensing through crunchyroll with every title.
Therefore, an alternative strategy is being developed in the early planning phase of an anime project, which includes the case that Crunchyroll either does not show any interest in an anime or only offers a small amount for the license.
Kudo explained that Crunchyroll is usually difficult for “Boys Love” anime. Therefore, this must be taken into account when planning and later also when sales. In such cases, the focus is more on the Asian and Japanese market as well as the sale of merchandise.
However, niche titles also offer opportunities for new platforms to gain a foothold in the anime market and build up a community. Netflix, which is even a 42 % market share in the international streaming income of anime even before Crunchyroll with 40 %, can intensify its anime strategy.
Via Toyo Keizai
© 2024 Matsuri Isora, Nanna Fuji / Cake / Serendia Academy Public Relations Department
