Crunchyroll, an American website and an international online community works in video streaming with East Asian media which includes auto racing, electronic entertainment, anime, drama, music and manga content. Crunchyroll was launched in 2006, as a for-profit streaming site and video upload content.
Crunchyroll was founded by a group of UC Berkeley graduates. The Crunchyroll channel and partnership distribution program delivers content to over five million online community members worldwide.
Crunchyroll is funded by The Chernin Group (an investment firm) and by TV Tokyo. Crunchyroll secured a capital investment of $4.05 million from Venrock, a venture capital firm in 2008. The investment drew mass criticism, coming from licensors Bandai Entertainment and Funimation because users were uploading copies of unlicensed titles.
This eventually led Crunchyroll to to begin securing distribution agreements with companies such as Gonzo (a journalism group that is written without claims of objectivity) for an increased number of titles. After announcing a deal with TV Tokyo on January 8, 2009, to air episodes of Naruto Shippuden. Crunchyroll stated its commitment to erase all copyright-infringed material from its site and host only material that it had the legitimate distribution rights.
Crunchyroll announced in 2010, it had acquired the North American DVD rights to 5 Centimeters Per Second (a Japanese animated feature film). This was Crunchyroll's first licensed DVD release.
The Chernin Group announced on December 2, 2013, that they had acquired a controlling interest in Crunchyroll for $100 million. The Chernin Group stated Crunchyroll's management and current investor TV Tokyo, would hold a "significant" stake of the company.
