TOEI ANIMATION

Supported by talented planning and production staff, who are able to develop strong properties, we have been able to create a stream of hits.

In the future, we will work to further expand our businesses by fully demonstrating our unrivaled planning and production capabilities to meet the needs of new market trends and times.

The company is currently digitizing the entire animation production process. This strategy aims to integrate the digitization of all activities from production of key animation, in-between animation, and backgrounds, to tracing, coloring, filming, and finishing. When this project is completed, paper and pencils will totally disappear from our studios, something that had been impossible until now. By pursuing this strategy, we will build a de facto standard for the digital animation age to come, and lead the industry.

The objective of our project is not simply to digitize the production process and reduce costs. Effectively using digital tools will also help our creators increase their productivity, and give them more creative freedom. The results will contribute to enhancing product quality and skills.

Viewers will be able to enjoy increasingly diverse content in the years ahead. PCs will be more common in homes, and will join cellular phones as media for viewing videos and playing computer games. In the current broadband era, the various content we own in digital form from the stage of raw materials will provide us with the resources for continuing to create new businesses in the coming years.

Besides our total digitization strategy, the company is building a system to network the business bases of each production process. Our Ohizumi Studio, Shinjuku Office, and Toei Animation Institute are linked by a LAN. Toei Animation Phils., Inc., our subsidiary in the Philippines, and Ohizumi Studio have already been put online. And, since the fall of 2000, we have been connected to 23 affiliated studios by optical cables. With the technical cooperation of NTT East Corp. and Celsys, Inc., we have started transmission and reception of large volumes of graphic data. CATAS
Networking has shown noticeable effects in the area of costs. With the production process fully digitized, no labor is needed to move animation materials, and a totally new dimension is opened up for the logistics of animation production. The impact of networking in this new dimension also extends to process management, production accounting, financial accounting, licensing, and data, as well as to supporting decision-making. This leads to reduced management costs and increased business efficiency.