New owner for Summit Entertainment

Posted by Theresa Milano On Saturday, January 14th 2012 in International

Movie and TV studio Lions Gate Entertainment Corp will start building up a powerhouse made of movies for teens and young adults after it purchases Summit Entertainment, the maker of the famous “Twilight” series. The purchase was announced on Friday and it costs $412.5 million. The “Twilight” franchise has already gathered more than $2.5 billion worldwide. Moreover, the purchase also gives the studio the first instalment of the four part series based on Suzanne Collins’ popular “Hunger Games.”

“They have a tremendous outreach with fans and the ability to reach them through email, Facebook, et cetera,” Lions Gate CEO Jon Feltheimer said when talking about Summit. “Starting right now, today, we are going to utilize that institutional knowledge to move ‘Hunger Games’ ahead even more quickly.”

The members of the management team announced they would remain to run Summit as a subsidiary.

“It was never about cashing out; it was about making sure this historic company we built continues to live on, now with healthy parental support,” Friedman said. “At the end of the day, this became the best and most exciting opportunity to keep the company going and make it 2 and 2 equals 5 or 6.”

As far as upcoming movies go, “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2,” the conclusion of the “Twilight Saga”, is due to be launched in November and promises to have fans rushing to the cinemas to see it.

The “Hunger Games” is just as popular, the three books in the series being ranked 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd in the USA Today’s best-seller list.