Care Bears Rightsholder Cloudco Acquired By Canadian Private Equity Firm Ivest

Barbie isn’t the only classic toy line moving big money this summer. Care Bears rightsholder Cloudco has been acquired by the Canadian investment firm Ivest Consumer Partners in a deal worth $100 million.

According to a report published by PE Hub, Ivest is excited by the existing commercial appeal of the Care Bears franchise and was especially eager to acquire Cloudco after Barbie’s incredible box office success this summer.

Here’s what we know about the deal:

• Created by artist Elena Kucharik for the greeting card company American Greetings, the Care Bears were quickly adapted to other forms of media and became one of the most popular toy and animation franchises of the 1980s.
• In 2018, American Greetings Entertainment, the IP licensing and entertainment arm of American Greetings, spun off as a separately run business and rebranded as Cloudco, which continued to shepherd brands including Care Bears, Madballs, and Holly Hobbie.
• Ivest is a private equity fund focusing on consumer products, licensing, and retail. It was founded by former Warner Bros. president of global consumer products and licensing George Jones. During his time with Warner, the company purchased licensing rights for the first three Harry Potter books.
• Explaining the appeal of Cloudco, Jones told PE Hub: “With Cloudco, most of their revenue is generated from IP. They have very high margins and do not require a lot of fixed assets. If a company is fortunate enough to have a classic evergreen property in their IP portfolio, as Cloudco has with Care Bears, it will continue to provide a dependable revenue stream at high margins for many years to come.”
• No specific plans for the Care Bears IP have been made public yet, but Jones did say that Ivest plans to monetize Cloudco properties while developing new content and IP. He said the company has already identified a list other properties within the Cloudco portfolio that would leave it “very well positioned to add value and mitigate risk at every level of the business to support management and ensure successful execution of their growth thesis.”
• Currently, the Care Bears star in the Boomerang series Care Bears Unlock The Magic, produced by Cloudco and Copernicus Studios.