After months of rumor and speculation, Marvel Enterprises and Sony Pictures Consumer Products have come to an agreement regarding licensing rights for November 2001 release Spider-Man: The Movie.

SPCP executive VP of worldwide consumer products Peter Dang and Marvel president and CEO Peter Cuneo say the merch program will be overseen by a joint venture called Spider-Man Merchandising L.P., with revenues split by category. Marvel will manage master toy, apparel, accessories, collectibles, gift and novelty, while SPCP will handle back-to-school, food and beverage, health and beauty, home furnishings, domestics, housewares, party goods, stationery, sporting goods, ancillary toys and video games. The publishing program will be shared.

Marvel Enterprises also announced that it is launching a new publishing program called Ultimate Marvel that will re-introduce its most popular heroes as teenagers, beginning with the X-Men and Spider-Man characters. New comics showing the heroes in their tumultuous teen years will be backed by licensed products, advertising and content on Marvel.com, along with the distribution of more than six million promotional comics.

Along with this summer’s X-Men: The Movie and the Spider-Man feature, Marvel is also planning upcoming releases based on The Fantastic Four (Fox), Incredible Hulk (Universal) and Blade 2 (New Line). Marvel has also launched an international merch program, appointing 4Kids Entertainment to rep the company in most of Europe and some Middle Eastern territories.