By Tadashi Sudo

A lecture “Fusion of Animation and Manga” by Production I.G President Mitushisa Ishikawa was held at CEDEC/Cofesta Developers seminar on September 25.

Production I.G has recently announced management integration with a Manga publisher Mag Garden. This management integration means fusion of Manga and Anime, as well as fusion of the story giver and the receiver, and so it is the center of attention.

Why Management Integration between I.G. and Mag Garden?
The seminar started off with the theme “Why is management integration between I.G and Mag Garden important”. The big power Manga stories have is a main reason for the integration. According to President Ishikawa, in order to get good Manga stories different force aside from fund and technology is required　in many cases. It is not easy to participate on business alliance.

Furthermore, from the experiences of staff exchanges, he was convinced that the integration will result in a big success. Management integration between Anime companies can only be addition, but integration between an Anime company and a publisher will be a multiplication, thus great success can be achieved.

After the first topic President Ishikawa talked about various topics such as current situation of producers, under production masterpiece Anime “Sky Crawler” by Mamoru Oshii, and necessity of changing management contents every 10 years.

These topics seem to have no connection to each other, but they all tie-up into the sense of crisis toward the current situation of Anime business of I.G and the necessity of creating new business.

Development of Production I.G Business
The management integration between Production I.G and Mag Garden is a big news for the Anime and Manga industry. However, from this lecture, it felt as though it is a mere step among various businesses I.G is currently working on.
Business development of I.G focuses not only at expansion of media such as Anime and Manga, but extends to wide variety of areas such as creation to production, original stories, co-production, rights management, agent function, etc. The company also pays a great attention to the internet.

Business of Production I.G aims to achieve business, mix which surpasses the usual media mix, and the total management of contents.

The success of these attempts is not guaranteed, but Anime business today has problems as a result of depending too much on profits of DVD sales.

New challenge in Anime Business is required by the whole Anime industry.

CEDEC/Cofesta Game Developers Seminar
http://cedec.cesa.or.jp/cofesta/
CEDEC
http://cedec.cesa.or.jp/
Cofesta
http://www.cofesta.jp/english/main.html
Production I.G http://www.productionig.com/
Mag Garden http://www.mag-garden.co.jp/

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