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Forum - View topicHow Much Does It Cost to License Anime Series?
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Lord Geo
Posts: 2699 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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An outstanding article, and one that I hope will be referenced & relied on for a good while. A perfect mix of telling fans stuff that we obvious don't know all about, but not so much that it could get anyone into trouble for revealing too much information that would otherwise be trade secrets.
However, one line really caught my interest:
OK, if Chris brought this up then that has to mean that it's actually happened at least once or twice in the past. Now I REALLY want to know what anime were actually considered "too cheap to license out" by Japanese licensors. |
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Angel M Cazares
 Posts: 5513 Location: Iscandar |
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Thank you for writing this article.
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Greed1914
 Posts: 4669 |
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This is a worthwhile article that I hope people read. I'm sure that at least some of why something like AnimeTube can attract backers is that many people are unaware of how much anime can cost. $100,000 in crowd funding seems great until you see that it might get you one episode of a popular or new series.
Those costs make it pretty clear why even the big players in the market wound up with even bigger companies backing them. And why the smaller ones have focused heavily on getting good at catering to a niche or cooperating with the bigger companies to serve a need they can't currently meet. |
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isahackjob
Posts: 55 |
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How much for MD Geist 1&2? We can make this happen.
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Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10468 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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Once or twice is a massive understatement. |
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Marzan
 Posts: 520 |
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Thank you for a very interesting and informative article.
So a top level series first run can cost around 5,6 million for a season? That’s real money. No wonder the small guys cannot compete |
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Shiroi Hane
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 7584 Location: Wales |
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> Imagine paying for a series that is supposed to be a little risqué, but receiving a show that ends up being borderline pornographic?
That would never happen surely? |
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kpossibles
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 152 Location: USA |
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Glad that there's an updated article on this topic! The last one that I could find was 9 years old and so much has changed since then.
Here's previous ANN articles on this topic: All About Licensing: Part I (2012): animenewsnetwork.com/feature/2012-06-11 ADV Court Documents Reveal Amounts Paid for 29 Anime Titles (2012): animenewsnetwork.com/news/2012-01-30/adv-court-documents-reveal-amounts-paid-for-29-anime-titles |
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Erufailon4
Posts: 202 Location: Finland |
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This is interesting. Am I right to assume that Netflix only buys streaming rights? (I looked up packaging scans of the American blu-ray of Violet Evergarden and it has ABC Animation's logo in the spine instead of Netflix's.)
So a typical 1-cour anime can cost $840,000 to $1.9 million in total to simulcast. That's a lot of money to pay for one isekai.
Funimation: *cold sweat* |
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Dayraven
Posts: 184 |
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I guess at some point, if the income’s small enough, the licensor would have to consider whether the work on their end in administering the deal and providing materials is actually worthwhile. |
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wjbraden
Posts: 39 |
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Pretty disgusting that so much money flows in just from a simple foreign licensing agreement that in some cases completely covers the entire cost of production, and yet animators struggle to survive. I think it's pretty clear the industry's setting itself up for another bubble burst, straight down to the insane pricing we became privy to through the ADV/Sojitz affair.
One question I have is, how do dubs factor into this model, does it make more financial sense for licensors to get their ROI back if they produce one or some such thing? I ask because we're for sure seeing greater dub output in the last few years than ever before, and for titles that would never have seen a dub previously. Oh also, though Adult Swim is the only one in the anime TV biz these days, is there any idea how much TV rights cost/what the procedure is for landing a deal on Toonami? |
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Top Gun
 Posts: 4830 |
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I will pay you double whatever it's worth to make it not happen. 
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10468 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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Netflix isn't particularly interested in physical media rights. I've heard of them picking them up and sublicensing them, but I've also heard of them passing on them, but requiring a holdback. However when Netlix "owns*" the show outright (as in, they paid the production studio to make it for them), they obviously also "own" the physical media rights and will license them out themselves (in this case Netflix is the licensor). *No one owns content. Copyright gives the copyright holder a limited, exclusive right to exploit the content. Copyright is not ownership.
I don't think we're in a bubble. Yes, costs have increased massively, but this is because revenue from streaming platforms is way up. Increased production costs and competition do play a part in this, but increased revenue is the primary driver. Licensees are offering MGs that they calculate based on expected revenues from the shows. The early 2000s bubble was entirely speculative and competition based, and not related to real-world performance.
Something needs to be done about animator pay. -t |
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relentlessflame
Posts: 188 |
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Regarding “originals,” I noticed in recent years that Crunchyroll has started labeling several shows as “originals” even though they otherwise have every appearance of being a normal Japanese Production Committee show (where CR may or may not be a member). I took this as sort of competitive branding against Netflix, which might reflect their exclusive streaming rights rather than “truly” being an original production. Of course, without knowing all the details, who knows…
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10468 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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Netflix does this too. Not every Netflix "Original" is the same arrangement. |
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