Genius Brands International Issues Statement in Connection With Second Quarter 10-Q Filing

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., Aug. 14, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Genius Brands International, Inc. (“Genius Brands” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ:GNUS), the global brand management company that creates and licenses multimedia entertainment content for children, today filed its 10-Q for the quarterly period ended June 30, 2020. The filing is available at: https://ir.gnusbrands.com/all-sec-filings.

Genius Brands Chairman & CEO Andy Heyward said:

“The Second Quarter of 2020 brought with it many exciting and pivotal developments at Genius Brands.

We launched Kartoon Channel! and announced with it the appointment of two of Hollywood’s most accomplished and proven executives, Margaret Loesch as Executive Chairman and David Neuman as Chief Content Officer. The channel launched June 15^th with notable shows like Angry Birds, Baby Einstein, Minecraft gaming content, shorts for both Rainbow Rangers and Llama Llama, and more. We achieved 100% broadcast sell-through of Rainbow Rangers across the Western Hemisphere and announced that toys for the property, by Mattel’s Fisher-Price, would debut at Walmart in August. We shared that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, in addition to being a key member of the production team for Stan Lee’s Superhero Kindergarten, elected to take his advance against royalties in the property as an investment in Genius Brands. 

Additionally, we shared that iconic film director John Landis signed on to the production team for Superhero Kindergarten, which now includes, among other talents, Fabien Nicieza (the co-creator of Deadpool) and Steve Banks (the head writer of SpongeBob SquarePants). We achieved all of this in just three months, and all of it during a pandemic and associated global recession, a time when many companies in the entertainment business have been forced to shutter, lay off or furlough their teams. 

Finally, and importantly, we raised equity to shore up our balance sheet and we retired our senior secured convertible debt. The company is now free of corporate debt, and with plenty of cash to execute its business plan for the foreseeable future.”

Robert Denton, Chief Financial Officer, added:

“Genius Brands’ financial position is stronger than ever. We have cash on hand, no corporate debt, and we are in a position to be opportunistic. It’s no secret that we are determined to grow Genius Brands into the dominant force in children’s entertainment, and we have both the human and creative capital with which to do so.