With Japan‘s animation industry recording its highest-ever market value — JPY3.8 trillion ($23.7 billion), according to the Assn. of Japanese Animations — Toei Animation is in Cannes this week to make the case that the next chapter of anime’s global story is one of co-creation, not just export. The timing is not incidental: Japan’s government Intellectual Property Promotion Plan, released by the Intellectual Property Strategy Headquarters, sets an explicit target of growing content-related overseas revenue from JPY4.7 trillion ($29.3 billion) in 2022 to JPY20 trillion ($124.9 billion) by 2033, with anime at the center of that ambition.
The studio established a Global Strategy and Content Creation department last year, a formal expression of a direction it had been moving toward for some time. “The era when anime was something made only by Japanese people is over,” says Asama Yosuke, general manager at Toei Animation. “From now on, we aim to create entertainment works rooted in local cultures together with creators from around the world.”
The clearest evidence of that approach is “Monkey Quest,” a family film that has assembled an international creative team in Tokyo. Producer Ikezawa Yoshi says the project’s makeup evolved organically. “What happened naturally was that many animators, designers and creators from around the world — people who had grown up with anime — wanted to come to Tokyo and work with us on the film.”
The result, Ikezawa says, is a visual identity that sits between traditions: “It still has strong anime elements, but at the same time, its look is somewhat more international, reflecting how anime has been received and interpreted around the world.” The film targets family audiences and, in Ikezawa’s framing, amounts to “creating a film with Western cultural values through the perspective of artists and animators who grew up with anime.”
That blending is deliberate and philosophically distinct from how Hollywood tends to approach global storytelling. “In Hollywood storytelling, especially in action films that travel globally more easily, there is often a tendency to remove as many specific cultural elements as possible,” Ikezawa says. “Our approach is somewhat different. We tend to build from those cultural values, embrace them and then tell those stories through anime.” The implication, he adds, is that a finished Toei co-production may not always wear its Japanese origins visibly — but the underlying grammar remains distinctly anime. “We believe that the anime aesthetic and the storytelling language of anime are already inherently Japanese.”
On what sets Toei apart from rivals also chasing international growth, Ikezawa draws a clear line. “We are not simply focused on exporting finished Japanese anime to the rest of the world. Our goal, wherever we work, is to tell stories that carry the cultural values of each region to the next generation.” The distinction matters at a moment when virtually every major Japanese animation studio is making some version of the same pitch to international partners. “It is not only about creating Japanese stories and exporting them overseas. It is also about creating stories rooted in each culture together with regional partners, and then expressing them through the strengths of anime.”
For Asama, the priority markets are shaped less by size than by energy. “We are discovering fresh and exciting things in areas with younger populations, such as Asia, India and the Middle East,” he says. On talent development — an industry-wide pressure point as production costs and labor shortages squeeze mid-tier studios — his view is pragmatic. “Creators don’t necessarily want to belong to a company — they want to create what they love. There is nothing better than having creators from around the world want to work on Toei Animation’s projects and collaborate with us.”
Asama is also measured on how far anime has actually traveled in terms of global perception. “I believe we are seeing a situation where people who first encountered Japanese animation decades ago are now rediscovering its evolution,” he says. “Anime is increasingly being recognized as a new visual genre with great potential — one that is not bound by fixed or old-style motifs. However, I do not think it has become a global standard just yet.”
On what success ultimately looks like, Ikezawa cuts through the industry language. “As producers, what means the most is when we see children, fans and audiences really enjoying our films — when you can actually see that excitement in their eyes. That is the moment when we feel the work has connected.”
The international segment of Japan’s anime industry has reached JPY2.17 trillion ($13.5 billion) — up 26% year-on-year — and now accounts for 56.5% of the total market, having exceeded the domestic segment for the second consecutive year.
Toei Animation, which has been producing animation for more than 70 years, is attending the Cannes Film Market as part of Japan’s Country of Honor program.
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