Oh dear god... (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-04/-dragon-ball-importer-funimation-said-to-tempt-universal-sony)
The article just said Sony's interested, not that they're actually buying. I doubt Funi's would be interested in being owned by Sony when they're making enough money as is.
Considering DuBoise is a former Universal executive, if anything I'd expect them to acquire it. Regardless, what these studios really want our of FUNimation are just the film rights to stuff like Dragon Ball Z and Attack on Titan. I doubt they'd interfere in the day-to-day activities of the company too heavily.
Considering how badly Sony is doing, this would be a bad idea for all involved. If they're hoping to make bank off of live action adaptions of Dragon Ball Z and Attack on Titan, then they must really have a short memory. But hey, they are making the Emoji Movie so this could happen after all.
FUNi and Aniplex are now sister companies. (http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/sony-pictures-tv-funimation-acquisition-1202511492)
Sony Pictures...
Hoo boy.
Funimation is the General Motors of Anime. If Sony blows them up then that's it for the industry.
Funi just released a brief FAQ regarding the Sony acquisition. (https://www.funimation.com/blog/2017/08/01/funimation-agrees-acquired-sony-pictures-television-networks/)
I guess the big thing to take away from this is that Aniplex will continue to have no involvement with Funi, which makes sense since Aniplex is under Sony Music Entertainment and doesn't interact often with other Sony divisions.
This is all dependent on whether Sony will continue to stay hands off in the long-run. Worst case scenario is Sony jacking up the prices to Aniplex levels and crashing the industry again (which hopefully won't happen since Sony Music is not involved with this deal). Best case scenario is Sony lets Funi do whatever and even gets some Sony-owned anime on streaming sites people actually use.
At least Chris Sabat is taking it in stride. (https://twitter.com/VoiceOfVegeta/status/892233159370256384)
So does this mean that Rick Santorum isn't a part of FUNi anymore or will use their facilities for his stuff?
Crunchyroll adds all FUNimation content to its library. Sony to start phasing out the FUNimation brand. (https://twitter.com/Variety/status/1498679780295782403)
The FUNimation streaming service is shutting down April 2. (https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/8/24065940/funimation-shutdown-crunchyroll-digital-library)
Thuh end.