Bandai and Itochu will invest $3 million in Ishinomori Entertainment, the part of the Ishinomori Group trading company that manages rights to character goods, including home video, from manga artist Shotaro Ishinomori (Kamen Rider, Cyborg 009).  Then in June a new company, Ishinomori Pro, will be created that will also house the copyrights of the Ishinomori Group.   The Ishinomori Group will control a 40% share of the new company, Bandai will have 35% and Itochu will own 25%, with the ultimate goal of developing a wider range of products based on the Ishinomori intellectual property.  

Last fall Itochu became a partial owner of the Comic Book Movies entertainment company, (see'Itochu Buys 10% of Comic Book Movies LLC'), which has an agreement to develop movies based on Ishinomori properties.  Itochu had also previosly invested in Ishinomori Entertainment.     

ADV recently announced it had secured North American broadcast rights to the 009-1 anime based on Ishinomori's classic manga series (see 'ADV Gets '009-1'').