Most Innovative Companies

The latest from Hasbro, Coach, NASA, and more.

Hasbro

When My Little Pony: The Movie hits theaters this October with characters voiced by Kristin Chenoweth and Taye Diggs, two things will almost certainly happen: Pastel ponies will remind us that friendship is magic, and Hasbro will reap the rewards. The toy company isn’t new to filmmaking; the Transformers franchise has earned $3.8 billion and helped boost sales in Hasbro’s boy category by 20% in 2014, when Age of Extinction came out. But My Little Pony is the first big animated release from Hasbro’s own production studio, Allspark.

The film, which will tap into the audience Hasbro has cultivated for the ponies, illustrates the company’s increasing focus on building robust franchises in-house. “As we tell stories around a [toy] brand,” says CEO Brian Goldner, “we activate them across our entire blueprint.” That includes games, books, television shows—and, now, film.

Hasbro is furthering this omnichannel mission with the inaugural Hascon, a three-day festival for fans, held in Rhode Island this September. Hascon will serve as a hype machine and testing ground for the company’s up-and-coming brands, including the Dutch-created Hanazuki, which is the basis for a popular Youtube cartoon, along with relaunched intellectual property like teen superhero Stretch Armstrong, soon to star in a Netflix series.

When it comes to elevating toys to the big screen, Hasbro will still work with powerhouses like Paramount, which it’s partnering with to create movies based on G.I. Joe, Micronauts, and other brands. But Allspark offers the toy maker more control. “The biggest risk,” says Goldner, “would be not participating in our content development, storytelling, and distribution.”

MILESTONES

In June, the toy maker launched the Hasbro Gaming Crate, a quarterly subscription box with new games.

CHALLENGES

Hasbro might struggle to turn lesser-known toys like Visionaries and M.A.S.K. into successful franchises.