Hasbro acquires Porsche licence for Transformers

[Seraphim Prime]

The recent fan roundtable reported on by the American sites indicate that vehicle licenses tend to be relevant only for the specific figure and the year of release.

Having one licensed figure doesn't guarantee a license for another figure, but it does at least provide a relationship that can be used to hopefully allow for other releases.

[reillyd]

Hopefully there will be enough goodwill towards Hasbro for the heavy promo in their movie that Hasbro can live off that for a few years.

I could be misremembering, but I’m pretty sure I read once that car manufacturers were PAYING for their vehicles to be used in the Michael Bay movies as promotions, rather than Hasbro going cap in hand saying “please may I use your car likeness”.

[Tha_Phantom]

I could be misremembering, but I�m pretty sure I read once that car manufacturers were PAYING for their vehicles to be used in the Michael Bay movies as promotions, rather than Hasbro going cap in hand saying �please may I use your car likeness�.

You'll probably find that it goes either way depending on the car/brand in question. In Porsche's case, I'd wager that Hasbro came to them as they've used an older Porsche for the movie not a current one (given that this film is set in the '90s there's not really any flexibility there). We also know that in the past Takara have tried to approach them for licensing and been rejected, so my guess is that a rather lucrative film and merchandising deal helped win Porsche over as opposed to "let us do this one Binaltech." I realise what was said above about nothing being guaranteed but I will still be very surprised if we don't see a sudden influx of Porsche toys over the next 12 months or so across various lines.