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Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

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Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#101

Post by brbrodude »

starbeast wrote: post #35
beerlord wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market failure got us to 400PPM. The externalities of carbon and methane pollution have not been properly priced in. That can be resolved with a market mechanism - a carbon tax. The free market has also brought us widespread electric cars, solar panels, gas power plants. The very things with which we will combat climate change. Socialism has brought us expanding populations globally, by offering free food to people w…

>The free market has also brought us widespread electric cars, solar panels, gas power plants. Massive government investment brought us each of those. >Socialism has brought us expanding populations globally, by offering free food to people who are not productive enough to buy it. The biggest threat to the planet now are the expanding populations of countries who still have their fertility rate above replacement rate…

The hard right solution: lets have some way to let the bottom half of the population drop out of the world. At least it's an honest take on capitalism ideology, gotta give it him!

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#102

Post by Mary-Jane »

williamdclt wrote: post #89
SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). Speak for yourself, I know I certainly do.

He has a point that it is very niche though (I never heard of them for example)

Ditto

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#103

Post by corobo »

relix wrote: post #53
SimonPStevens wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case I think the primary reason is to protect the company. Aardman is probably a fairly hot company right now. Probably prime for a purchase by one of the big studios. But then it would most likely just get broken up and turned into a mill for churning out look-a-like content. Or possibly even just a logo stamped on contracted out content. I believe the founders have been fairly clear in the past about not be…

Either it's hard to create the content, or it is not. If it's not hard, the studios don't need to buy Aardman. The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). If it is hard, the studios would need to keep the employees who manage to do this hard thing, and it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it…

> The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway)

I'm guessing you're outside of the UK? I'd put my money on you being to ask 10 people at random here and at least half of them recognise the name for Wallace and Gromit if nothing else

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#104

Post by RobertKerans »

relix wrote: post #53
SimonPStevens wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case I think the primary reason is to protect the company. Aardman is probably a fairly hot company right now. Probably prime for a purchase by one of the big studios. But then it would most likely just get broken up and turned into a mill for churning out look-a-like content. Or possibly even just a logo stamped on contracted out content. I believe the founders have been fairly clear in the past about not be…

Either it's hard to create the content, or it is not. If it's not hard, the studios don't need to buy Aardman. The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). If it is hard, the studios would need to keep the employees who manage to do this hard thing, and it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it…

> and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman

From a UK perspective I think you're pretty wrong here. Aardman cant be separated from the style they've built over the last 30 years, and it's incredibly popular. Even if someone didn't recognise the name, you could show most people a even a single frame from one film and they'd recognise what it was immediately.

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#105

Post by CPLX »

alehul wrote: post #96
SimonPStevens wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case I think the primary reason is to protect the company. Aardman is probably a fairly hot company right now. Probably prime for a purchase by one of the big studios. But then it would most likely just get broken up and turned into a mill for churning out look-a-like content. Or possibly even just a logo stamped on contracted out content. I believe the founders have been fairly clear in the past about not be…

> It can now only be sold if the majority of employees vote to accept the sale Maybe I'd be wrong, but I feel like it would be far easier to buy a company from a group of middle-class minority shareholders than a couple wealthy owners. A big payout sounds easier to refuse if you're already satisfied financially. Are we sure that remaining independent is the motivation here?

Well sure but then you’re left with a company full of skilled people who the company depends on, that you just made financially independent.

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#106

Post by alehul »

Retric wrote: post #100
alehul wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It can now only be sold if the majority of employees vote to accept the sale Maybe I'd be wrong, but I feel like it would be far easier to buy a company from a group of middle-class minority shareholders than a couple wealthy owners. A big payout sounds easier to refuse if you're already satisfied financially. Are we sure that remaining independent is the motivation here?

It’s not nessisarily a big payout when you get ~1/1,000 of it.

With 140 employees and assuming equal distribution of the 75% I believe they were giving out, it's around .5% ownership or 1/200. Not huge, but at a $100M buyout offer (didn't they have $25M in sales, and growing?), we're talking $500k a head. Even at a $25M buyout, its $125k a head. That type of money is enough for a middle-class family to usually succumb.

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#107

Post by platz »

C1sc0cat wrote: post #91
Angostura wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Black sheep in what way?

They outsourced their cleaners and some of the way the constitutional set up works is counter to the spirit of the coop movement

No true scottsman, eh?

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#108

Post by notyourday »

nightski wrote: post #6

Sorry for the naive question, but how does this work? So let's say the employees now are part of this trust which owns 75% of the shares. What is the benefit? The trust owns the shares legally correct? Is it some sort of profit sharing scheme? I assume you don't hold on to the shares when you leave the company (as they are with the trust)? Does every new hire dilute the ownership? How does this actually impact the da…

It's knee-jerk accolades. Shares held in a trust with workers being beneficiaries would just enrich trustees. In fact the workers now have even less say to what is happening in the company because it costs enormous amount of money to make trustees to do anything they do not want to do.

Re: Aardman Animation Is Giving the Company to Their Employees

#110

Post by 52-6F-62 »

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #59
relix wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Either it's hard to create the content, or it is not. If it's not hard, the studios don't need to buy Aardman. The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). If it is hard, the studios would need to keep the employees who manage to do this hard thing, and it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it…

> no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). Speak for yourself, I know I certainly do.

I can second this. I grew up with Wallace and Gromit (Canadian, here), and I've always loved their work.
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