Star Wars begin between rival resorts
Anti-trust violations over Spider Man could create legal problems for Universal and Disney.
When Disney purchased Marvel for $4 billion, problems were bound to occur between rivals that have had some bitter exchanges in the past. For years, Marvel has licensed it's Super Heroes exclusively to Universal theme-parks, but now that has all changed.
Some of the best-known characters including X-Men, Incredible Hulk, and Spider-Man have been under a licensing agreement with Universal for over 15 years. With this new awkward marriage between the rivals, Disney can verify the amount of royalties payed by Universal, audit Universals accounting, and to critique promotional material featuring Super Heroes.
Between the two giants, they command roughly 90% of the theme park business in Orlando. That said, certain scenarios of anti competitive behavior could create vulnerability resulting in price-fixing.
Recently, Universal and Disney signed corporate agreements not to share information with it's theme parks creating a type of firewall between the two rivals. It appears that the two companies are trying to stem off any possibility of antitrust behavior before it becomes a problem.
With price collusion, two parties can agree on a price increases on particular brands while eliminating price competition ultimately creating a financial burden for the customer who can't negotiate a better deal between similar products.
Albeit last year when regulators signed off on the Marvel acquisition, signing an agreement may have been part of the justice departments push to mitigate avenues of communication between competitors in the theme-park market.
Who knows if Universal had some concern whether it's new competitor had access to their financial information.
It will be left to be seen just how tricky this complicated relationship between arch-rivals will pan-out over the next couple of years.
When Disney purchased Marvel for $4 billion, problems were bound to occur between rivals that have had some bitter exchanges in the past. For years, Marvel has licensed it's Super Heroes exclusively to Universal theme-parks, but now that has all changed.
Some of the best-known characters including X-Men, Incredible Hulk, and Spider-Man have been under a licensing agreement with Universal for over 15 years. With this new awkward marriage between the rivals, Disney can verify the amount of royalties payed by Universal, audit Universals accounting, and to critique promotional material featuring Super Heroes.
Between the two giants, they command roughly 90% of the theme park business in Orlando. That said, certain scenarios of anti competitive behavior could create vulnerability resulting in price-fixing.
Recently, Universal and Disney signed corporate agreements not to share information with it's theme parks creating a type of firewall between the two rivals. It appears that the two companies are trying to stem off any possibility of antitrust behavior before it becomes a problem.
With price collusion, two parties can agree on a price increases on particular brands while eliminating price competition ultimately creating a financial burden for the customer who can't negotiate a better deal between similar products.
Albeit last year when regulators signed off on the Marvel acquisition, signing an agreement may have been part of the justice departments push to mitigate avenues of communication between competitors in the theme-park market.
Who knows if Universal had some concern whether it's new competitor had access to their financial information.
It will be left to be seen just how tricky this complicated relationship between arch-rivals will pan-out over the next couple of years.
posted by michael at
7:22 AM
