Marvel and Toy Biz :: essays research papers

My previous two columns have focused on the story of my temporary involvement with a group of investors seeking to purchase question Comics in January, 1998. As I related last time, my role in examining the respond documents was to analyze the licensing division with an eye as to how much potential tax income we could anticipate from this area. In the end, I had to tell my fellow investors that there really wasnt a whole lot of licensing potential left. Either the rights were hopelessly intricate due to bungling on the part of Marvels legal staff, or that close to of the decent licensing properties had already been sold for many years forward, in deputise for upfront cash payments in previous years. The one area that held slightly potential was the possibility of somehow breaking the ToyBiz royalty-free licensing agreement. That license not just now gave ToyBiz the rights to produce any and all Marvel toys in perpetuity, but similarly granted them a zero royalties rate It seemed quite plausible to me that the nonstarter court had the discretion to void such an encumbering agreement. That, in fact, was exactly what investor/ pillager Carl Icahn was seeking in his reorganization plan for Marvel. He was so certainly he could have the toy contract terminated that he take care upwards of $200 million of his money, and that of closely allied investors, by buying Marvel bonds at distress prices. It was exactly the prospect of losing their sweetheart agreement which made ToyBiz owners Isaac Perlmutter and Avi Arad passionately committed to purchasing Marvel. ToyBiz was almost completely unfree on its Marvel license for its survival, so there was no carriage they could give up on this deal. That is why Perlmutter arranged his own financial backing group, and ultimately bid over $400 million for Marvel. Returning to our enthronization group, while I was reading the licensing agreements, the bankers whom I accompanied to the Marvel bankruptcy trustees o ffice went over the financials. We were originally going to work through the darkness to establish a criteria under which we could craft a bid for the company, or some part of the company. We stopped for lunch at 1 PM, however, and it pronto became apparent from our conversations that no one in our group thought Marvel was worth anything near what Icahn and Perlmutter were bidding.