1982–1990: Early history as Henson Associates subsidiary '' in 1983. The name would be stylized as "hit!".
Peter Orton had met
Jim Henson when he was at the
Children's Television Workshop handling distribution of
Sesame Street. As a result, he became close friends with Henson and went to work with him in 1981. Together they set up Henson International Television, which was the international distribution arm of
Jim Henson Productions the following year, with Orton becoming the company's CEO.
1989–1999: Becoming independent spun off Henson International Television and changed its name to HIT Communications PLC.|left Beginning in the late-1980s, Jim Henson Productions began negotiations with
The Walt Disney Company regarding a possible purchase of a merger. Upon hearing these talks, Orton and other employees at HIT! convinced Henson to allow them to spin off the distribution arm as an independent distribution company. Following Henson's approval, in October 1989, Orton led
management buyout of Henson International Television and re-incorporated the subsidiary as a standalone company named HIT Communications PLC. Under its new name, HIT no longer held distribution rights to Henson's catalogue, and instead began acquiring other programs for international distribution, including
Woodland Animations'
Postman Pat and
Bagdasarian Productions'
Alvin and the Chipmunks, and later international acquisitions like
Lyrick Studios'
Barney & Friends. Beginning in 1991, HIT would begin to engage in co-producing shows which they would distribute internationally, with the first two as part of this new strategy being ''
Where's Wally? and Captain Zed and the Zee Zone. The company then began to finance and distribute animated feature films based on The Wind in the Willows and Peter Rabbit'' books. Helping to fund the company was an investment by British satellite and cable television operator
Flextech took a 23% share in HIT for about £600,000. The HIT Wildlife division was created to produce nature and wildlife programming which provided the company with 35% of its revenue by the mid-1990s. This early partnership was an early plan for that led to HIT purchasing Lyrick for $275 million, In April 2002, HIT Entertainment sold its wildlife division to the newly formed Parthenon Entertainment, which was owned by the former managing director of HIT Wildlife, Carlos "Carl" Hall, with its 30 hours of programming in production and its 300-hour library was transferred in the
management buyout agreement. The board of
Gullane Entertainment agreed to have the company be purchased by HIT for £139 million. The television shows owned by Gullane included
Thomas & Friends,
Magic Adventures of Mumfie, and
Fireman Sam, which a stake of was purchased from
S4C months before. On 22 August 2002, HIT Entertainment officially opened its Canadian office in
Toronto. In March 2003,
CCI Entertainment, the Canadian affiliate of Gullane who owned a minority stake in CCI's shares prior to the HIT purchase, announced they had ended their partnership with HIT and re-acquired their shares in the company, including all of their programming libraries, which made out half of Gullane's catalogue. The shows CCI reacquired were put into the company's CCI Releasing subsidiary. HIT's next television series
Rubbadubbers aired in September of the same year. On 1 April 2004, HIT and The Jim Henson Company agreed to a five-year global distribution and production deal which included distribution of 440 hours of TJHC's remaining library, including
Fraggle Rock, ''
Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas, The Hoobs, and Jim Henson's Mother Goose Stories. In addition, the agreement also included the production of new properties, including Frances
, in which both companies co-produced and co-owned the copyright to the series. While firing its chief executive Rob Lawes in October 2004, the company announced its launching of a 24-hour preschool channel known as PBS Kids Sprout with PBS, Comcast, and Sesame Workshop.''
2005–2011: Apax Partners ownership On 22 March 2005,
Apax Partners purchased HIT for £489.4 million, taking it private, with former BBC director general
Greg Dyke becoming chairman. On 26 August 2005, HIT announced an agreement with
NBCUniversal,
PBS, and
Sesame Workshop to launch the world's first 24-hour preschool television channel entitled
PBS Kids Sprout, with HIT supplying programming for the channel as a result at the time. In February 2006, HIT closed its DVD sales and distribution arm in the U.S. and signed a deal with
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment to release their content in the North American market. The deal would significantly boost HIT's distribution to over 70,000 retail storefronts. On 8 March 2007, HIT announced they had purchased the
Rainbow Magic book franchise with intentions to create a media and consumer lineup for the property. On 22 March, HIT acquired
S4C's 50% stake in
Fireman Sam, taking full ownership in the franchise. S4C would remain an executive producer for upcoming seasons and retain all Welsh-language rights to the property. On 18 June 2007, HIT announced a strategic alliance with
Chapman Entertainment to represent
Fifi and the Flowertots and
Roary the Racing Car in North America and Japan. In September, HIT and
Chellomedia formed a joint venture to run the
JimJam children's channel. Also that same month, HIT entered into an agreement with
Aardman Animations to represent licensing and home entertainment distribution for
Wallace & Gromit,
Shaun the Sheep and Aardman Classics in the US and Canada, which was later extended in June 2008 to include
Timmy Time as well as worldwide representation for Aardman's themed attraction business. HIT Entertainment opened its own toy company, the HIT Toy Company. In October, after failing to supply
ITV a new series of
Sooty the previous year, HIT announced they had put the Sooty Limited/Bridgefilms venture up for sale, consisting of both
Sooty and
Magic Adventures of Mumfie, an earlier Britt Allcroft creation. In 2008, HIT underwent a range of sales for IPs previously put up for sale. They sold
Guinness World Records to
Ripley Entertainment in February,
Magic Adventures of Mumfie back to
Britt Allcroft in March and
Sooty to his current presenter
Richard Cadell in June. Alongside that, they had hired former
Nickelodeon executive,
Jeffrey D. Dunn, as chief executive. Dunn drove the company to create new characters, including
Mike the Knight, and to revitalize existing brands. In April, HIT secured a first-look deal with israeli-based animation studio Smartoonz to secure distribution rights to
Little Fables and to co-produce and represent
Monkey See, Monkey Do and
Clay Play. In November, HIT licensed the
Art Attack IP to
Disney to revive the series for Latin America. This partnership eventually led to Disney purchasing the
Art Attack property from HIT by 2011. In January 2009, HIT announced the production of its next production,
Little Charley Bear. However in October,
Chapman Entertainment took over production for the series while HIT would remain as a distribution agent for television and home entertainment. In March 2009, HIT started up a theatrical film division, entitled HIT Movies, in
Los Angeles with Julia Pistor as division head, to create films based on the company's franchises. The division's first planned film adaptation was a live-action
Thomas & Friends film, scheduled for late 2010. In early 2010, HIT licensed
Thomas & Friends to
Mattel for toys and struck a deal with the
Albavisión conglomerate, to supply its television stations across Hispanic America with 600 hours worth of its catalog. By August, the company withdrew from the JimJam joint venture, but agreed to continue providing programming for the channel until the absorption into Mattel. In April 2011, Apax put HIT up for sale, with the option to sell the company in two parts:
Thomas & Friends franchise and the other HIT characters with its PBS Kids Sprout stake, with either part or separately. Several bidders came forward, including
The Walt Disney Company,
Viacom,
Mattel,
Hasbro,
Classic Media,
Chorion, and
Saban Brands. excluding its share of the
PBS Kids Sprout television channel. The sale/merger was completed on 1 February 2012, and HIT Entertainment became a wholly owned subsidiary of Mattel, which was managed under its
Fisher-Price unit. Due to the success of the
Thomas & Friends brand, which accounted for 80% of HIT's revenues, there was talks of Mattel only wanting to purchase that franchise rather than the entire HIT library. Mattel had already worked alongside HIT Entertainment and handled marketing for
Thomas & Friends toys. On 3 July 2012, it was reported that Mattel considered selling and sought a buyer for
Barney and
Angelina Ballerina, but they eventually kept them. HIT announced a DVD distribution deal with
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment on 2 May 2014. in which Universal began distributing their catalogue for Blu-ray and DVD electronic sell-through and VOD platforms in the United States and Canada. Prior to MIPCOM 2014, Mattel reorganized and consolidated its internal media sales divisions for its other brands into HIT. In early summer 2015, the
Edaville USA amusement park in
South Carver, Massachusetts opened a licensed Thomas Land theme area based on
Thomas & Friends. On 31 March 2016, HIT was absorbed into a newly created division called
Mattel Creations. ==References==