Culver City-based Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. on Aug. 10 closed a deal to acquire anime streaming service Crunchyroll for almost $1.2 billion.
 
The entertainment conglomerate announced plans to buy Crunchy Roll from Dallas-based AT&T Corp. in December. San Francisco-based Crunchyroll has 5 million streaming subscribers and more than 120 million registered users across 200 countries,
 
Sony Pictures intends to expand its presence in the anime industry. The company plans to combine Crunchyroll’s operations with those of Funimation, an Asian media dubbing and distribution company Sony Pictures Television acquired in 2017.
 
“With the addition of Crunchyroll, we have an unprecedented opportunity to serve anime fans like never before and deliver the anime experience across any platform they choose,” Tony Vinciquerra, Sony Pictures chairman and chief executive said in a statement. “Our goal is to create a unified anime subscription experience as soon as possible.”

Crunchyroll offers ad-supported video on demand, manga content, mobile games and events merchandise. It has more than 1,000 anime titles in its library and distribution rights for more than 30,000 episodes.