Nikkei Asia reported on 30 October that Sony is in the process of purchasing Crunchyroll from AT&T for just under $1 BILLION. Crunchyroll is among the leaders of streaming anime specific content. The move by Sony will remove the need to license their content. The price may change as Sony has the exclusive right to negotiate the offer.
Back in August AT&T offered Crunchyroll to Sony for US$1,5 billion but Sony didn’t want to agree on the price. After a while, AT&T started asking a price of at least US$1 billion. Back then, AT&T was presenting the offer to multiple potential buyers, not only to Sony.
Sony has its own popular anime like “Kimetsu no Yaiba” (“Demon Slayer”), but has been licensing it to streaming services. Sony’s Aniplex, the studio behind “Kimetsu no Yaiba,” has a variety of content, including movies and music, that is mainly distributed by overseas companies, Nikki said
In July 2020, Crunchyroll said they have 70 million free users and 3 million subscribers globally. Acquiring Crunchyroll would mean that Sony could compete against platforms like Netflix and other streaming services.
We are excited for what’s to come!
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Source: Nikkei Asia