Anime Expo mulls move from Los Angeles
Plus: Bilibili finds new momentum with profitability; South Korea's Krafton acquires anime advertising giant ADK; Harmony Gold and Bigwest reengage; and more
This is your weekly Animenomics briefing, covering the business of anime and manga. Today is Wednesday, July 16, 2025.
In case you missed it: The United States will abolish in 2027 duty exemptions on imports below US$800 in value—also known as the de minimis exemption—under a policy bill signed into law earlier this month.
What’s at stake: Combined with tariffs under the Trump administration, the end of the de minimis exemption in two years could discourage U.S. anime fans from spending on cross-border e-commerce purchases for anime merchandise.
Organizers weigh future of Anime Expo in Los Angeles
Anime Expo, North America’s largest anime fan and industry convention, is weighing a move from downtown Los Angeles after 18 years, says the Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation, the non-profit group that organizes the event.
Why it matters: SPJA estimates that this year’s Anime Expo delivered an economic impact of more than US$110 million to area businesses, which Los Angeles stands to lose if the event moves elsewhere.
By the numbers: Turnstile attendance this year was 410,000, inching up 0.7 percent compared to 2024, a sign that the 867,000-square-foot (80,500-square-meter) Los Angeles Convention Center is reaching capacity.
In comparison, last year’s turnstile attendance grew 3.8 percent from 2023 levels.
Friction point: SPJA can’t grow Anime Expo without more space at the convention center, and labor expenses and venue costs for the event are also rising.
The bigger picture: The City of Los Angeles is no longer able to expand the convention center in time for the 2028 Summer Olympics, pushing off the earliest timeline for completion of the construction project until 2029.
Anaheim Convention Center 30 miles away is double the space of Los Angeles Convention Center, but it’s further from the offices of anime companies and other locations where side meetings and events often happen.
What we saw: SPJA has been creative with recent Anime Expos by claiming outdoor plazas to add activity space beyond the convention center floor, but even that started showing its limits this year.
What we’re watching: Whether Anime NYC on the other side of the country, with its 3,300,000-square-foot (310,000-square-meter) venue, could soon take over the crown of North America’s largest anime convention if Anime Expo can’t grow attendance.
Bilibili gains new momentum after first quarterly profit
Chinese video streaming platform Bilibili’s annual animation, comics, and gaming expo Bilibili World returned to Shanghai last weekend bigger than ever, marking a new surge in the country’s ACG market as young fans come of age.
Why it matters: China’s ACG market turnaround stands in contrast to just two years ago, when Bilibili and other online platforms pulled back on content spending amid cooling investment in the Internet and technology sector.
Catch up quick: Bilibili’s business has a new momentum as the company reported its first-ever quarterly net profit in the fourth quarter last year, driven by surges in mobile gaming and advertising revenues.
Turnstile attendance at Bilibili World 2025 grew a staggering 60 percent over last year to 400,000, with the event increasing its floor space by 30 percent.
Zoom out: The event left a substantial economic impact on Shanghai’s transportation, accommodation, and consumer sectors, says the city’s government.
Sales increased 31 percent year-over-year at Shanghai’s Bailian ZX Creative Centre, a shopping mall for anime and video game merchandise that has been likened to Tokyo’s Akihabara district.
Tourism bookings in the city jumped 35 percent for the week of Bilibili World, according to data compiled by travel booking platform Meituan Travel, and 15 percent of bookings at high-end hotels were made by visitors born after 2000.
What’s next: As Bilibili grows, the company is making its presence further known in Shanghai.
It’s building a new headquarters with 800,000 square meters of commercial and office space to host 100,000 employees, scheduled to open in October 2026.
Clippings: Bain sells anime advertiser ADK for ¥75b
Japanese advertising giant ADK will be purchased from private investment firm Bain Capital by South Korean video game publisher Krafton, best known for its hit battle royale game PUBG: Battlegrounds, for ¥75 billion (US$516 million). (Reuters)
What we’re hearing: The acquisition will likely inject new energy in ADK, which holds partial rights over the intellectual property rights of popular anime titles like Doraemon, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and Crayon Shin-chan.
Foreign tourists’ purchases of anime and manga merchandise are estimated to have totaled ¥54.3 billion (US$372 million) last year, up 53 percent from 2016, according to an analysis by the Meiji Yasuda Research Institute. (The Mainichi)
Zoom in: About 8 percent of foreign tourists visited sites featured in anime and films last year, according to annual tourism survey data from the Japan Tourism Agency.
Japanese sound production studios are seeing increased demand for Japanese-language dubbing for video games made in China, driven by strong affinity from local developers for Japanese anime and video games. (Nikkei Asia)
LINE Manga’s mobile app was the highest-earning consumer application in Japan’s mobile market for the first half of 2025. This is the second consecutive six-month period that LINE Manga has earned more than Kakao Piccoma. (Yonhap News Agency)
Webtoon Entertainment reorganized its live-action film and series production unit Wattpad Webtoon Studios with a rebrand into Webtoon Productions and added new executives to oversee IP development. (The Hollywood Reporter)
Akira’s live-action film rights have reverted to manga publisher Kodansha after film studio Warner Bros. opted not to renew the rights after spending more than 20 years and tens of millions of U.S. dollars on development. (The Hollywood Reporter)
Harmony Gold and Bigwest reengage at Anime Expo
“Our relationship is cordial.”
— Tommy Yune, Harmony Gold USA president of animation, on relations with Bigwest
Context: Yune told attendees of the Robotech panel at Anime Expo that Harmony Gold USA still has a working relationship with Bigwest, one of the primary Japanese rightsholders of the Macross anime franchise, from which Robotech was adapted.
Bigwest representative director Kaya Onishi was also present in the panel room, lending weight to Yune’s statement, though she wasn’t introduced to the audience.
Behind the scenes: “A meeting between Bigwest and Harmony Gold did take place at Anime Expo,” Harmony Gold USA vice president of marketing Kevin McKeever confirmed to Animenomics, but he wouldn’t comment on specific topics discussed.
The meeting, likely the first face-to-face meeting between the two companies in years, was made possible because Bigwest made its first Anime Expo appearance this year by working with Los Angeles-based rights management firm SOZO IP to bring Macross programming to the convention.
Rewind: An agreement struck in 2021 ended 20 years of disagreements between Bigwest and Harmony Gold USA on the distribution of Macross and Robotech titles.
On the prospects of a Robotech live-action film being developed at Sony Pictures, McKeever told panel attendees, “Movies need a chain of 10,000 people to say yes. Right now, 9,999 people have said yes, and the last person is saying no.”
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