Disney is dropping the word “Fox” from the names of the iconic movie studios it bought from Rupert Murdoch’s Twenty-First Century Fox Inc., according to news reports.
The company paid US$71.3 billion in 2018 for a controlling share of the 20th Century Fox film and TV studios, but it didn’t buy Murdoch’s broadcast divisions, including the Fox TV network and Fox News.
Watch: Disney grosses more than $10 billion in 2019. Story continues below.
20th Century Fox will be known as 20th Century Studios and Fox Searchlight Pictures will be renamed Searchlight Pictures, Variety reported on Friday. The TV studios, which Disney also owns ― 20th Century Fox Television and Fox 21 Television Studios ― will not be renamed as yet, the magazine reported.
Disney doesn’t want there to be confusion between its brands and Fox Corp., the company that now owns Fox News and the Fox TV network, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a “person familiar with the matter.”
The famous 20th Century Fox logo will remain the same, except without the word ‘Fox’ in it, Variety reported.