the Mouse House Finally Reached the $71.3-Billion Deal to Acquire 21st Century Fox America, Inc., Which Will Take Effect on March 20

Editor：Turing

On March 12th, Marvelous Realm released a message on Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox on Twitter, a foreign social platform. Disney’s $17.3 billion acquisition of Fox’s assets has gained authorized approval, with the closing date to be “12:02 am on March 20 (ET) ”.

Founded in 1934, Fox is one of the oldest film studios in the United States, famous productions including Star Wars and X-Men. Its main subsidiaries include Fox Networks Group and STAR.

Disney’s acquisition of the 21st Century Flowserve started in 2017. In December of 2017, Disney announced that it would acquire part of 21st Century Fox’s assets with $52.4 billion stocks and assume 21st Century Fox’s $13.7 billion’s debt. The deal has encountered twists and turns, including Comcast’s bid for the 21st Century Fox and the obstacles from government.

Disney’s acquisition of Fox undoubtedly created history: making Fox an independent studio; reshaping Hollywood’s landscape; returning Marvel’s superhero IPs; further enhancing Disney’s competitiveness.

First, after the merger, Fox will become an independent studio. Through this transaction, Disney acquires film production business, Hulu’s controlling stake, entertainment channels such as FX and Nat Geo, and other assets of 20th Century Fox. In the meantime, 20th century Fox will officially end, with its employees facing layoffs and other important changes. The part of the 20th Century Fox asset not acquired by Disney will be form a new company, Fox, which will include Fox broadcast network, Fox News and Fox Sports. Fox Studios is expected to operate independently like other studios owned by Disney.

Secondly, viewing from the market structure, the acquisition has turned Hollywood’s “Six Giants” structure into a “Five Giants” one: Disney, AT&T, Netflix, Universal, Sony, Paramount. 80% of foreign films in the future will be produced and released by these film companies while Disney will occupy more than one-third of the North American film market. Among them, Netflix has achieved well in the film and television market globally as an Internet company. As Disney’s biggest competitor, it will develop rapidly and affect Hollywood profoundly. AT&T will also become a new giant covering film production, TV channels, satellites, mobile networks and fiber optic cables, second only to Disney.

The excellent IPs of the 20th Century Fox will also be handed over to Disney, including Marvel Superhero IPs. After this transaction, Disney will gain copyrights of famous films and TV series like “X-Men”, “Avatar”, “Titanic”, etc. The sci-fi masterpiece “Avatar 2” by famous director James Cameron will also be released by Disney. IPs such as “Alien”, “Kingsman” and “The Simpsons” will be handed over to Disney, and new works will appear. Marvel’s heroes will finally gather in “Marvel’s The Avengers” soon.

The acquisition of 20th Century Fox also strengthens Disney’s competitiveness. In the first place, Fox’s new media business will complement Disney’s shortcomings. Although Disney has a long history, its new media industry still lags behind compared with some emerging companies. Though Hollywood traditional giants have an advantage in content, their streaming media is relatively weak. It is urgent to strengthen the layout of their platforms while Hulu in the acquisition will provide complete platform support for Disney.

In addition, the acquisition helps Disney break the creative restrictions of film projects. With this merger, policies like “the strongest smoking ban” of Disney will become relatively flexible. Moreover, under the name of the 20th Century Fox, Disney’s productions will be more diversified, avoiding missing outstanding productions like before.