Walt Disney Company is a leading American entertainment company. It operates theme parks and resorts, produces and distributes motion pictures, and runs a number of broadcast and cable television networks and channels. The company also sells a variety of merchandise based on the Walt Disney name and characters.
The Walt Disney Company owns and operates Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, California, which opened as Disneyland in 1955, and Walt Disney World Resort near Orlando, Florida. Walt Disney World opened in 1971 with the Magic Kingdom, a theme park similar to Disneyland. Today, in addition to the Magic Kingdom, this resort includes Epcot (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow), which features futuristic technology and cultural exhibits; Disney’s Hollywood Studios; Disney’s Animal Kingdom; and two water parks. Disneyland Resort includes two theme parks—the original Disneyland Park and Disney California Adventure Park, which celebrates the state’s varied regions. In the United States, the Walt Disney Company also financed Celebration, Florida, a planned community that opened in 1995. The company’s international operations include Tokyo Disney Resort, which opened in 1983; Disneyland Resort Paris (1992); Hong Kong Disneyland (2005); and Shanghai Disneyland (2016).
The Walt Disney Company has a number of motion-picture units. Walt Disney Pictures creates family entertainment films. Touchstone Pictures and Hollywood Pictures produce films for adult audiences. The Disney company also owns Pixar Animation Studios and Lucasfilm Ltd., a movie and television production company. Lucasfilm Ltd. includes Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), which creates special visual effects for movies, and LucasArts, which produces electronic game programs.
In the field of television, the Walt Disney Company owns ABC, Inc., which operates the ABC television network. Cable TV networks operated by Disney include Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, the ESPN sports channels, and Freeform. The Disney company’s assets also include the video-on-demand streaming service Hulu. Yet another part of the company, the Disney Music Group, produces recorded music under several labels.
In 2009, the Walt Disney Company purchased the comic book and action hero company Marvel Entertainment. And in 2019, the company bought most of the assets of 21st Century Fox, then one of the world’s largest entertainment media companies.
Walt Disney founded the company as Disney Bros. Cartoon Studio in 1923. It soon was renamed Walt Disney Productions. The company got its current name—the Walt Disney Company—in 1986. Its headquarters are in Burbank, California.
