How Owning Their Intellectual Property and Artwork Allowed Rovio to Profit BIG on Licensing the Angry Birds Brand!
Introduction
It’s easy to dismiss Rovio, the Finnish gaming company behind Angry Birds, as a one-trick pony. But the truth is that Rovio has built a licensing juggernaut around its original IP and created a new business model for itself that’s bigger than just games. In fact, it’s larger than any other mobile games company in the world—and has been for years now!
IP Ownership is Essential
When it comes to owning your intellectual property, you need to own everything.
That’s right—everything.
That means everything from the brand, to the characters and story, to the artwork and other elements that make up your IP. Because when all these components are owned by one party, they can be licensed out and generate revenue for that owner. And that’s exactly what Rovio did with their Angry Birds brand.
One of the biggest takeaways from the Angry Birds story that often gets overlooked is that they own their intellectual property.
They own their artwork, copyrights, and trademarks.
They own their brand and their unique software processes…Over 48 patents and patent applications.
They own their IP which allows them to commercialize and generate revenue by licensing it to others!
How Rovio Transforms IP Ownership into a Licensing Gold Mine
Rovio, the developer of Angry Birds, is another great example of a company that has turned IP ownership into a licensing gold mine. Rovio’s concept is simple: create games that people love to play and then license them out for use in other media (for example, Angry Birds is now a popular movie and TV show).
Rovio licenses the Angry Birds brand and the related characters to product manufacturers and content producers. In 2021, brand-licensing business unit accounted for approximately 3% of group revenue. Over 2 Billion Angry Birds consumer products have been sold since 2010; in 2021 there were over 100 licensees globally who use the Angry Birds brand in various different products and services. Additionally, the two Angry Birds movies – The Angry Birds Movie (2016) and The Angry Birds Movie 2 (2019) – have created almost USD 500 million box office movie franchise!
Conclusion
Rovio is not just an example of how IP ownership can be transformed into a licensing gold mine for companies, but also shows that overcoming obstacles to success can sometimes mean developing new strategies and approaches. In the case of Rovio, it was realizing when they needed to move beyond physical products and focus on digital platforms like mobile apps. This change allowed them not only to engage in new markets but also create products that were more profitable than ever before!
Lessons Learned
You can own the content that makes your company unique.
Owning your intellectual property is not a new concept, but it’s still one that many business owners don’t understand.
It’s not just about owning copyrights and trademarks, either…
It’s about owning the processes that make your company unique. It’s about owning your brand and protecting it from being used by others without permission. It’s about owning your artwork so that you can use it on products with permission and sell those products to generate revenue.
When you own intellectual property, you can license it out to other companies who can use it in their products or services—and they’ll pay YOU for the privilege of using something that only belongs to YOU!
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