Disney Mobile is an American division of

Disney Consumer Products Disney Consumer Products, Inc. is the retailing and licensing subsidiary of the Disney Experiences segment of The Walt Disney Company. Previously, Consumer Products was a segment of Disney until 2016, then a unit of Disney Consumer Products and I ...

, which is in itself a division of

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was founded on October 16 ...

, that designs mobile games and apps, content and services.

History

In August 2000, Walt Disney Internet Group (WDIG) entered the mobile content market in Japan with an agreement with NTT DoCoMo to launch the Disney-i content service. In November 2003, WDIG and Index Corporation agreed to "develop and distribute Disney-branded mobile content for the Chinese market" and that Index would, in conjunction with China Mobile, work to launch the Disney Mobile service. Walt Disney Internet Group launched DisneyMobile.com in December 2003 as a portal for Disney Mobile content. Starting in January 2004, WDIG licensed Disney Mobile content to

KPN Koninklijke KPN N.V. (Royal KPN N.V. in English), trading as KPN is a Dutch List of telephone operating companies, telecommunications company. KPN originated from a government-run postal, telegraph and telephone service and is based in Rotterda ...

, a prominent Dutch telecom firm. In March 2004, WDIG agreed to a licensing deal with

Vodafone Vodafone Group Public Limited Company () is a British Multinational company, multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates Service (economic ...

to provide Disney Mobile services in 14 countries: Australia, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Malta, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. Also in 2004, Disney re-activated the Starwave identity as Starwave Mobile, which publishes casual games for mobile phones for non-Disney brands within Disney's conglomerate or from third parties. Sprint and Disney had previously launched a phone service for sports fans using content from Disney's sports channel,

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

, branded Mobile ESPN. The company, that worked with Sprint, started a

mobile virtual network operator A mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) is a wireless communications services provider that does not own the wireless network infrastructure over which it provides services to its customers. An MVNO enters into a business agreement with a mobil ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

, which launched in June 2006. Earlier, DMobile and O2 agreed to a

agreement in April 2006 for the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. In August 2006, DMobile halted its plans to roll out its wireless service in the UK, citing "adverse changes in the retail environment for its decision". In September 2007, DMobile stopped signing up new wireless customers and discontinued the wireless service altogether on December 31, 2007. DMobile decided to shift its strategy by licensing its mobile suite, Family Center, and its content to other providers. However, in November 2007, Disney Japan and

Softbank is a Japanese multinational Investment company, investment holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, that focuses on investment management. The group primarily invests in companies operating in technology that offer goods and services ...

announced a wireless service joint venture, Disney Mobile, to be launched in 2008. In July 2010, Disney purchased

Tapulous Tapulous, Inc. was an American Computer software, software and video game Video game developer, developer and Video game publisher, publisher headquartered in Palo Alto, California. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company as pa ...

to increase available mobile expertise. In 2011, Bart Decrem of Tapulous was appointed general manager of DMobile. Launched September 22, 2011, '' Where's My Water?'', a mobile game, starring Swampy the alligator - the first Disney original mobile character - rivaled ''

Angry Birds ''Angry Birds'' is a Finnish media franchise created by Rovio Entertainment, and owned by Sega. The game series focuses on the titular flock of colorful angry birds who try to save their eggs from green-colored pigs. Inspired by the game ''Cr ...

'' for 20 days in October 2011, even becoming the top mobile game on the

iTunes iTunes is a media player, media library, and mobile device management (MDM) utility developed by Apple. It is used to purchase, play, download and organize digital multimedia on personal computers running the macOS and Windows operating s ...

bestseller charts for a short time. This has led to a YouTube channel with a web series for Swampy. ''Where's My Water?'' has inspired several spin-offs, including “ Where's My Perry?” and “ Where's My Mickey?”. Also launched by DMobile in September 2011 was ''Puffle Launch'', a mobile version of the game played on Club Penguin. In October 2011, working with

Spin Master Spin Master Corp. (formerly known as Spin Master Toys) is a Canadian multinational toy and entertainment company. Spin Master employs over 1,600 people globally with offices in Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Ital ...

, DMobile launched the first Disney Appmates game with ''

Cars 2 ''Cars 2'' is a 2011 American animated spy comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. It is the sequel to '' Cars'' (2006), the second film in the ''Cars'' franchise, and the 12th animated film from the studio ...

'' toys that interact with an iPad screen. With a decrease in venture capital flowing into game companies, Disney Interactive, including Disney Mobile, has been able to find co-development partners easier. This co-development model has lifted Disney to have 11 games among the 200 most-downloaded. Disney Mobile teamed up with Imangi Studios to release a version of '' Temple Run'' based on the film '' Brave'', titled ''Temple Run: Brave''. DMobile teamed up with developer Hipster Whale to release ''Disney Crossy Road'' on April 6, 2016, which in two days became the top downloaded game on

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

Wireless

In the US, Disney Mobile operated on Sprint's

CDMA Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communicatio ...

network. Disney handled the administrative side and marketed the service to family subscribers. Disney Mobile's offerings included Family Center suite, a multiple family-friendly applications to help parents manage their family's mobile phone experience. The innovative family monitor and call control features allowed parents to set spending limits and decide when the phone could and couldn't be used. The family locator service allowed parents to use GPS to locate their child's phone. There was also a family alert feature that let the whole family send text messages to each other. Disney and Sprint had hoped that Disney Mobile content and applications would help drive demand for data services.

Game support

Disney Mobile is well known for producing a myriad of games for

and Android, but due to the limitations of its support team, it must discontinue old games before releasing new ones. Some games, such as '' Where's My Water?'' will continue to be supported indefinitely.

Related developers

* Rovio Entertainment * Outfit7 *

Kongregate Kongregate is an American web gaming portal and video game publisher. Its website features over 124,000 online games and 30+ mobile games available to the public. The company also publishes games for PC, mobile, and home consoles. It was purchase ...

* Jam City *

Kabam Kabam (formerly Watercooler, Inc.) is a Canadian video game developer and publisher founded in 2006 and headquartered in Vancouver, with offices in Montreal, San Francisco, and Austin, Texas. The company develops and publishes massively multipl ...

Executives

*George Grobar, senior vice president and

General manager A general manager (GM) is an executive who has overall responsibility for managing both the revenue and cost elements of a company's income statement, known as profit & loss (P&L) responsibility. A general manager usually oversees most or all of ...

(2005–2008) *Bart Decrem, General manager (2011–present)

References

External links

Disney Mobile Official Website
(Japanese) {{United States mobile communications brands Sprint Corporation Companies based in Palo Alto, California Defunct mobile phone companies of the United States Disney Interactive Mobile game companies Mobile phone companies of Japan Mobile virtual network operators SoftBank Group NTT Docomo