According to this news post, Kodansa and Dai Nippon Printing have apparently bought Vertical, which we all know by now is a manga publishing company that has published various Tezuka works lately, including other quality manga works.
Recently Kodansa had announced that it will be going into the American manga market with their own new publishing company, Kodansa USA. As a result of this, the companies Del Ray (which shut down three months ago as Kodansa USA gradually takes over its manga) and TokyoPop had lost their licenses to manga that are also published by Kodansa in Japan.
Vertical had been involved with Kodansa before lately, such as with the English edition of the magazine 'Morning', and partnering up with certain manga titles. Ed Chavez of Vertical had also mentioned that they would be working more with Kodansa on an assortment of things.
On Vertical's Twitter page, the following were said:
@WilliamFlanagan: It's good news for Vertical's owner(s). Also good news for the staff. A company with no Jpn publisher backing will be kind of lost soon.
@WilliamFlanagan: But having gone through an ownership change in a company, it can be a very tricky time for the people used to their woking conditions.
Currently this is all that is known, and at the moment, things are a bit too early to predict on what exactly might happen to Vertical and its licensed titles.
Discuss.
For the record, I'm now also worried about UDON.
Edit: ANN has suggested that the two companies are going to invest in Vertical, however I find that it is still too early to tell.
I guess this is an indication that the Japanes manga market is doing really well, and the U.S. market is going down? Are Japanese companies buying out European companies? Also, has Dark Horse lost their rights already? And Viz?
