About the studio
Asatsu-DK, often shortened to ADK, was founded in 1956 by Masao Inagaki with just four employees, under the name Asahi Tsushinsha. It merged with Dai-Ichi Kikaku, founded in 1951, in 1999 to become Asatsu-DK, and today it's one of Japan's largest advertising agencies, based in Toranomon Hills, Minato, Tokyo. *From four employees to one of the country's biggest ad agencies, that's a genuine long game.* ADK has deep ties to anime, both as a production committee financier for long-running franchises like Doraemon and Crayon Shin-chan (through subsidiary ADK Emotions) and as the parent company of animation studio Gonzo. Nearly 70 years after starting as a tiny communications firm, ADK sits at the intersection of advertising and anime financing in a way few other agencies can match, having built ownership stakes on both the money side and the production side of the business.