What was Steve Jobs Pixar-related wealth at the time of Pixars public listing and at the time of Disneys acquisition of Pixar?

What was Steve Jobs return on his founding Pixar investment?

RAISING CAPITAL/BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK CASE STUDY effects. Star Wars owes much of its success to the power of its animation, was taking a fresh look through the eyes of its new special effects. CEO, Michael Eisner. Eager to return Disney to the glory days Although computer technology was nascent in development as the animation innovator, Eisner was convinced that Pixar's and completely unused in the early Star Wars franchise films, technology was well ahead of the competition. Pixar's technol- Lucas was convinced that it could eventually play a critical role ogy was incorporated release of Beauty and the Beast in 1991. in special effects. However, after a thorough assessment of the Steven Spielberg used Pixar technology in Jurassic Park to gen- state of computer technology, Lucas concluded that no indi-erate photorealistic images of dinosaurs. vidual firm nor any group of firms together were on the path to Pixar was a technological marvel. But it was unprofitable. developing useful computer technology capable of devel-oping Even Steve Jobs was getting impatient with the company's inabil- the computerized effects he wanted. He would need to build his ity to find a business model that could monetize its technology. own computer division. With the survival of Pixar at stake, John Lasseter pitched Disney Ed Catmull was hired away from the New York Institute of with an idea that would bring in needed cash. But Disney had Technology in 1979 to head Lucasfilm's computer division. Lucas different plans. They were trying to woo Lasseter to be a Disney wanted Catmull to do three things: 1. develop a computer sys-director. Lasseter came up with the idea of a Christmas special tem that could edit a film's visual and audio components digi- from a toy's perspective. Pixar would produce the movie and tally; 2. create a laser printer capable of exporting images and Disney would distribute it. After a string of failures and lessons, sound directly to film; and 3. generate graphics in digital format. Toy Story was created. Toy Story was released on Thanksgiving John Lasseter, who began his animation career as a student Weekend in 1995. It opened at #1 and would become the high- at Cal Arts (a school founded, funded, and patterned on Waltest grossing film of the year, making $192 million in the United Disney's animation) was fired from The Walt Disney Company States and $362 million worldwide. for promoting computer animation. He joined the computer The completion of Toy Story taught the company a lot about graphics division of Lucasfilm in 1983 where he combined his computer animation. It also taught them a lot about business. animation skills and director's flair with the group's technolog The company had given away much of the positive economic ical capability benefit of its first hit to Disney. Jobs sat down with the com- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan includes a simple scene of the pany and determined they needed to move from being a pro- "Genesis Effect" where a lifeless planet is rapidly transformed duction company to being a studio. Such a move would require by lush vegetation. The whole scene was generated in a com- a lot of capital. At the end of Toy Story's first week, Pixar listed puter animated sequence by the Lucasfilm computer division. its shares in the largest initial public offering of the year. The It was the first of its kind. Other small projects incrementally company sold $132 million in stock for $22 per share. Steve Jobs, refined the group's capabilities until they were asked to make the company's largest shareholder, still held 80% of the com- a stained glass knight emerge from a window and walk in the pany's stock. movie Young Sherlock Holmes. From Pixar's IPO to Disney's acquisition of the company for By the spring of 1985, the computer division's technology, $7.4 billion in May 2006, Pixar produced seven animated fea- Marionette and Render Man, set the technological standard ture films, all of which were blockbusters. in film industry but commercial success was still far away. Meanwhile, Steve Jobs was forcibly and very publicly removed Pixar Animated Feature Productions from Apple Computer Company, which he started in 1976 and Productions through Aquestions, Box Office Rocopts are in US$ illons developed into a multi-billion dollar enterprise. Release Title Global Box Office Jobs was introduced to Pixar by Alan Kay, a computer sci Nov 08 A Toy Story entist and personal friend of Jobs. On 30 January 1986, Jobs A Bugs LITO purchased the Lucasfilm computer division which had been Toy Story 2 named Pixar and only had forty employees, for $10 million. Over Nov 01 Monsters Inc the next decade Jobs wrote personal checks of $60 million to Finding Nome support Pixar. In 1988 Pixar released Marionette, a proprietary The Incredibles animation system in addition to Render Man, a proprietary ren- dering software. Cars Sales of Marionette and RenderMan continued to be soft. But a remarkable combination of leading technology and a crafts- PIXAR FUNDING AND VALUATION WATERFALL man's ability to tell stories in John Lasseter led to production Steve Jobs purchased the company from Lucasfilm for $10 mil- of computer generated animation in short films and advertis lion and invested an additional $60 million in the company. ing spots. Lasseter and Bill Reeves received an Academy Award Assume that until the company went public, Steve Jobs held for their short Tin Toy, which became the basis for their first 100% of Pixar's shares. After Pixar went public it had 96.3 mil- full-length motion picture, Toy Story. Integration of computer lion shares outstanding and 80% of those were held by Steve animation into commercial advertising spots for Tropicana, Jobs. The shares were listed at $22 per share. Pixar's shares were Trident, and others provided Pixar with some cash to help pay publicly traded from 28 November 2006 to 8 May 2006, when their bills and pursue their artistic endeavors. Pixar was purchased by Disney for $7.4 billion. Disney, which used to look disdainfully on computer Bloomberg LP. US Box Office 101.8 376 Nov 08 1628 363.0 Nov 90 245.0 407.4 543.4 May on 3307 8002 2614 633.0 Nov 04 Jun 06 2441