Three Japanese anime companies back AniBiz, a marketplace for anime licensing
Three of Japan's top anime licensors have invested in AniBiz, a website built to help companies find and strike deals for anime rights. Nakama, the startup behind the platform, raised an initial $6 million from TBS Group, Toei Animation and TV Tokyo Holdings, Variety reported on 27 October.
Licensing is how anime travels beyond Japan and beyond the TV screen. A rights holder, or licensor, lets another company use a series or its characters, in return for money or a share of revenue. The buyer is the licensee. It might be a toy maker, a game studio, a clothing brand or a broadcaster in another country.
AniBiz describes itself as a business-to-business marketplace, meaning it is built for companies rather than fans. Rights holders, including studios and production committees (groups of firms that jointly fund a series), can list their titles. Licensees can submit proposals to licensors directly through the site. The platform also keeps a database covering thousands of anime series. It lists who made each show, its voice cast, synopsis and ratings, along with which rights are available and in which territories and time periods, known as territorial windows.
The company was launched in July by Kun Gao, the founder and former chief executive of Crunchyroll, the streaming service devoted to anime. He is joined by former Crunchyroll executives Brady McCollum and Sae Whan Song. Nakama announced the launch in a press release on 2 July, describing AniBiz as an industry-first official marketplace for global anime rights and licensing.
When it launched, the site hosted 20 licensors. It now hosts more than 30, according to Variety's October report.
Most of this work happens out of sight. A viewer who streams a series rarely sees the contracts that decide which countries get it, in which language, and on what date. Platforms like AniBiz aim to make that process quicker to search and easier to start. The investment is an early step, and the amount is described as initial, so further funding is not yet known.
