It is official and it has been announced that The Walt Disney Company is acquiring Lucasfilm Limited from the Star Wars creator, George Lucas, for over $4 billion to be split in half between cash and Disney stock. $2 billion in cash? Maybe he wants to swim in it like Scrooge on a bad day?
Jokes aside, it was just 6 years ago that The Walt Disney Company bought out the late Mr. Steve Jobs', Pixar Animation Studios, for $7.4 billion after Pixar successfully franchised half a dozen different projects including the popular Toy Story and Finding Nemo films. This acquisition left Jobs with the largest shareholder stake in Disney at 7.4%. He didn't have remotely the same stake in Apple even after Apple acquired Jobs' NeXT, Inc. for a cool $400 million in 1996 once British programmer, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, invented the WorldWideWeb (WWW) in 1995 using one of Jobs' NeXT computer systems.
This development certainly doesn't come without some "icing on the cake." Disney now has plans on producing 3 more Star Wars films with the first arriving on screen in 2015 and where Lucas will only be consulting and not writing nor directing. Lucas has revealed that he is tired and burnt out on producing anymore Star Wars films, so Disney has decided to "buy Lucas" and his franchise.
"May the force be with you."
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