How to Train Your Dragon 2 has earned more than critical acclaim for DreamWorks Animation — it’s earned a good chunk of change.
Enough for the company to beat expectations in announcing Wednesday its third-quarter results.
The company reported $11.9 million in net profits for the quarter ending in September on $180.9 million in revenue. That’s up from 10.1 million in profits for the same quarter last year on $154 million revenue.
Dragon 2 was the dominant factor in the result, having grossed more than $615 million at the worldwide box office.
Movies generated sales of $142 million and a segment gross profit of $64 million, with Dragon 2 contributing $74.2 million to revenue all on its own. Recent movie titles such as Turbo, The Croods, Rise of the Guardians and Mr. Peabody and Sherman also added to that total, while the library brought in a total of $50.2 million.
TV programs — mainly the Netflix series Turbo F.A.S.T. and DreamWorks Dragons; Riders of Berk on Cartoon Network — generated $14.3 million in revenue including $2.3 million in gross profits.
CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg says the company is investing in television, consumer products, location-based and retail opportunities, digital and its Oriental DreamWorks studio. DreamWorks also plans to reduce the production costs of its animated movies.
