FUNimation Serves 8 Million Anime Views

 

"Anime Leader Tops 8 Million On-Demand Views in March" 

[Source: Mania.com; Written by Chris Beveridge] 

 

FUNimation Entertainment today reported an over 200% annual increase in the number of episode views on its streaming video on demand network.

 

In the last three months, FUNimation has seen an average monthly increase of 15 percent, cementing its status as North America’s hub for programming straight from Japan and double the number of episode views of its nearest competitor. 

 

Funimation.com is a free video destination offering more than 100 anime series available on-demand, at any one time, making favorite anime series just a simple click away and with new episodes and shows added weekly.
 

“Our significant investments in talent and infrastructure are paying off as we have successfully transitioned to be an internet company as well as a marketing, brand management and distribution company,” says Carly Hunter, Vice President of FUNimation. 

 

FUNimation president and CEO Gen Fukunaga attributes this explosive growth from year to year (March 2009 – March 2010) to not only the unrivaled breadth and quality of content that FUNimation offers, including English-language subtitled episodes as well as English-dubbed, but also to the company’s ability to promote and market its streaming network.

 

“Numbers like these show how popular anime has become among the North American mass entertainment audience as well as the value of the medium,” said Fukunaga. “We've helped redefine the viewing habits of millions of people and those figures will continue to grow as we increase our line-up and as always, offer exclusive content.”

AKIRA Motorcycle

A-list Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio is going to produce his first feature movie, and he's going to do it in style. DiCaprio is planning to make a movie out of the very popular Japanese manga movie, Akira.

The 1988 Akira animation became famous because of it's very futuristic motorcycle, the symbol of the movie.

The original Akira was set postapocalyptic New Tokyo, 2019. The plot goes like this: Kaneda is a bike gang leader whose close friend Tetsuo gets involved in a government secret project known as Akira. On his way to save Tetsuo, Kaneda runs into a group of anti-government activist, greedy politicians, irresponsible scientists and a powerful military leader. The confrontation sparks off Tetsuo's supernatural power leading to bloody death, a coup attempt and the final battle in Tokyo Olympiad where Akira's secrets were buried 30 years ago.

DiCaprio may film the movie into two parts, so expect a sequel. It will be set in "New Manhattan", a city rebuilt by Japan.

On the Akira motorcycle front, the bike is so popular, that recently someone made a real replica of it, and it looks pretty good. [Source: Motorbiker.org]