Disney Buys Pixar

So Steve Jobs (Pixar's CEO) has sold Pixar to Disney for the price of $7.4 Billion U.S .

Disney's CEO Bob Iger Says: "I think this is great for Disney, not only to have Pixar be part of the company, but to have Pixar influence the company," Disney Chief Executive Robert A. Iger told The Associated Press in an interview Tuesday after the deal was announced. "It's also possible we'll look at Pixar and see not only how well it's run but how well it lives and seek to overlay that influence on some of our other businesses."

Steve Jobs says: "Disney and Pixar can now collaborate without the barriers that come from two different companies with two different sets of shareholders," Jobs said in a statement. "Now, everyone can focus on what is most important, creating innovative stories, characters and films that delight millions of people around the world."

Looks like Ed Catmull becomes President of the both Disney and Pixar Studios, John Lasseter becomes Chief Creative Officer of Animation and Principal Creative Adviser of Imagineering. Also, Steve now owns the most shares of Disney of any single shareholder, since he owned approximately 3 Billion dollars worth of Pixar's shares which get transferred directly into Disney shares. I believe he joins the Board of Directors.

As a result of this, David Stainton, the current (or was current) president of animation at Disney is leaving.

A post on This Blog quips that at it's current pricing, Apple could potentially buy Disney outright, saying "Even after dropping from a high of $86 to 76, AAPL has a market cap of $64B, versus $50B for Disney."

What all comes out of this is that it seems that Disney is keeping Pixar standalone, but we'll have to see how it develops. I believe the merger still has to under government approval or something, so Pixar or the Government could potentially stop a deal being made. But it does look like it's going to happen.

Crazy crazy.

[UPDATE] A quote from Disney's corporate site: "Both Disney and Pixar animation units will retain their current operations and locations." Link here.