Brand of the Day: Pixar
Welcome to Brand of the Day, where we pick the brand making headlines and explain what you need to know about why it's in the news.
Pixar films are renowned for their box office success and the studio’s latest release is no exception after Inside Out generated $91.1m in the US box office over the weekend, making it the highest opening of all time for an original film.
The new animated comedy follows a young girl on the brink of adolescence and her emotional struggle as she tries to come to terms with moving to a new town. The film has been written and directed by Pete Docter, the man behind Pixar’s Up, and has received rapturous reviews as well as boasting a rating of 98 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes.
Here’s more behind the Pixar brand.
Pixar was originally founded in 1979 as The Graphics Group and was a small computer division within Lucasfilm.
George Lucas sold The Graphics Group to Steve Jobs in 1986 for $10m. Jobs sold the hardware division in 1990 and moved the company to California.
It was renamed Pixar after its central creation, the Pixar image computer. They sold this technology to government groups and the medical industry.
Pixar’s iconic lamp present in its logo was created by John Lasseter, one of the three founding fathers of the studio. It was part of a short animated demo called Luxo, Jr and was originally intended to be a tech demo to sell hardware.
Pixar’s films have made around $3.7bn at the US box office and $8.7bn across the worldwide box office. Disney purchased the company in 2006 however Pixar remained a separate entity and retained its name.
