- Sandbox Group’s educational streamer PlayKids Learning is heading to New Zealand for the first time as a Prime Video add-on subscription (US$3 per month). Offering animated series such as Blue Zoo’s Alphablocks and Little Engine Moving Pictures’ Cutie Pugs, PlayKids is already available in other countries including the US, the UK, Australia, France and Italy.
- GKIDS has acquired North American rights to two coming-of-age anime films from Kyoto Animation—A Silent Voice (2016), about a boy who tries to make amends with a girl he bullied at school; Liz and the Blue Bird (2018), about two high-schoolers preparing for a concert band performance. US screenings of A Silent Voice are set for December 15 and 16.
- Under a new sports license, Tokyo’s TOMY Company is gearing up to release two FC Barcelona-branded BEYBLADE X battling tops across major APAC markets in January. The rollout will start in Japan before hitting nine other regions, including South Korea, China, the Philippines and Thailand.
- Miami-based publisher Mad Cave Studios has expanded its existing deal with Japan’s Tatsunoko Production to create comic books based on the studio’s iconic Speed Racer franchise (pictured). Tatsunoko adapted the manga IP, which originated in the ’60s, as a popular anime series that aired on Japan’s Fuji Television and in US syndication.
With files from Ryan Tuchow