© Hideaki Anno
Production I.G announced on Friday that it has appointed anime director Hideaki Anno as a member of its company board of directors. Anno is the founder and president of the studio Khara, which also confirmed the announcement. The appointment will go into effect on August 21.
Tomonori Tanaka, a current board director of East Group Holdings Inc., will also become a company board director of Production I.G on the same date.
Anno is perhaps best known for Gainax‘s seminal Neon Genesis Evangelion television anime, which spawned a massive media franchise with films, spinoff manga and novels, and many other related media. Many creators in anime, manga, and games cite it as an influential work. Anno later founded the studio Khara in 2006.
At Khara, Anno completed a tetralogy of Evangelion films that reimagined the original 1995 anime, beginning with Evangelion: 1.0 You Are [Not] Alone in 2007, and concluding with Evangelion: 3.0+1.0: Thrice Upon A Time in March 2021.
Anno is one of the co-founders of the legendary anime studio Gainax (then known as Daicon Film). The company was first noted for producing the anime shorts that opened the Daicon III and Daicon IV science-fiction conventions in 1981 and 1983. The 1987 film Royal Space Force – The Wings of Honnêamise was the studio’s first major anime project, and like many of the Gainax founding members, Anno wore many hats in the film’s production, including animation director, storyboard artist, and special effects artist. Anno would remain a fixture in the animation of the studio’s later works. He parted ways with Gainax in 2007.
Anno is also the writer and co-director of the Shin Godzilla film, the writer of the Shin Ultraman film, and the director and writer of the Shin Kamen Rider film. Shin Ultraman opened on May 2022, while Shin Kamen Rider opened in March 2023. All three are some of Japan’s most well-known pop culture characters, representing kaiju (giant monster) films and tokusatsu (special effects) films. Anno has not shied away from his love of kaiju and tokusatsu media, and has openly cited their influence on his work. He has recently co-written scripts for the Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX television anime.
Production I.G is known for producing anime such as Mamoru Oshii‘s Ghost in the Shell, Kaiju No. 8, Psycho-Pass, and Blood: The Last Vampire. Mitsuhisa Ishikawa first joined Tatsunoko Productions after college, before co-founding Production I.G (then known as I.G Tatsunoko) with Takayuki Gotō in December 1987. The company was renamed to Production I.G in 1993.
IG Port — the parent company of animation studios Production I.G and Wit Studio — entered into a capital and business alliance with character and merchandise company Sanrio. The transition went into effect on July 3. With the stock acquisition, Sanrio is now the fourth biggest shareholder of IG Port alongside NTT Docomo. Ishikawa, who is IG Port’s founder, CEO, and president, owns 18.9% of the company, followed by Dentsu Group and NTV, who each own 9.85% of the company.
IG Port was also the parent company of the anime studio Signal.MD, but it merged Signal.MD into Production I.G on June 1.
Sources: Studio Khara, Production I.G, (link 2) via Denfamico Gamer, My Game News Flash