MARVEL NAMES BILL RAHN AS MANAGING DIRECTOR, FOCUSING ON ASIA; APPOINTMENT IS INTEGRAL TO INTERNATIONAL LICENSING GROWTH STRATEGY
Reflecting an integral component of its strategy to expand its base of international licensing activity, Marvel Enterprises, Inc. (NYSE:MVL) announced today that it has appointed Bill Rahn, a senior licensing, consumer products and brand management executive, as Managing Director, Japan and Asia. Mr. Rahn will be based in Tokyo and will report to Tim Rothwell, President of Marvel’s Worldwide Consumer Products Group.
Commenting on the appointment, Tim Rothwell said, “Having worked with Bill throughout the years, I am confident that he brings the perfect combination of skills, experience and relationships to leverage Marvel’s consumer brand awareness into the Japan/Asia-Pacific markets. We believe that this appointment, combined with the team we are putting in place in London to focus on European opportunities, will be instrumental in significantly raising the contribution from international licensing opportunities, a component of our licensing activities that to date has been under-served. Bill is already working to leverage the significant untapped licensee and consumer demand for Marvel-branded consumer products in this key territory.”
Mr. Rahn comes to Marvel with more than seventeen years of international marketing and licensing experience including the last seven years as Managing Director at Universal Studios Consumer Products Group Japan and Asia-Pacific, and the last two years as President of Universal Pictures Video Japan. Mr. Rahn’s primary focus at Marvel will be on developing and managing licensing and merchandising initiatives in Japan and Asia-Pacific, markets where Marvel character feature films have demonstrated very strong consumer demand.
During his tenure at Universal, Mr. Rahn was responsible for all of Universal Studios Consumer Product Group’s (USCPG) licensing activities in Japan and Asia-Pacific, including Australasia and China. He is credited with increasing licensing in the territory by ten-fold by focusing on Universal’s core characters and properties. Mr, Rahn also played a role in working with Universal Studios Japan in the lead-up to the theme park’s opening in 2001. During the last two years of Mr. Rahn’s tenure with Universal, he had the added responsibility of overseeing the start up of Universal Pictures Japan, Universal’s Home Video business, where he developed the expansion of the sell-through sector for this division and focused on the acquisition of local companies.
Prior to joining Universal Studios, Mr. Rahn served as the Chief Marketing Officer for McDonald’s Japan from 1993-1994. He was previously General Manager of the international division of Simon Marketing and was responsible for opening their Tokyo office. Mr. Rahn is fluent in Japanese and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Japanese Studies from Yale University. He resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife and two children.
About Marvel Enterprises
Marvel Enterprises, Inc. is a leading global character-based entertainment licensing company that has developed and owns a library of over 4,700 characters which have entertained generations around the world for over 60 years. Marvel’s operations are focused in entertainment and consumer product licensing and comic book publishing. Marvel’s creative teams at its Marvel Studios, Marvel Comics and Toy Biz divisions support the development of feature films (and DVD/video), video games, TV series and toy lines based on its characters. Marvel also licenses its characters for use in a broad and growing range of consumer products and services including apparel, collectibles, food and promotions. Marvel Comics is a leading global comics publisher and an invaluable source of intellectual property; Marvel Studios works with studios to develop feature film and entertainment projects; and Toy Biz is a recognized leader in toy design, sales and marketing that develops and oversees both licensee and in-house toy lines. For additional information visit http://www.marvel.com.
Except for any historical information that they contain, the statements in this news release regarding Marvel’s plans are forward-looking statements that are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, including a decrease in the level of media exposure or popularity of Marvel’s characters, financial difficulties of Marvel’s licensees, changing consumer preferences, movie- and television-production delays and cancellations, toy-production delays or shortfalls, continued concentration of toy retailers, toy inventory risk, the imposition of quotas or tariffs on products manufactured in China and a decrease in cash flow even as Marvel remains indebted to its noteholders. These and other risks and uncertainties are described in Marvel’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Marvel’s Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K. Marvel assumes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements.
