Sanrio Co. has bought the rights to the Mr. Men animated characters from Chorion Ltd., looking to cut its reliance on Hello Kitty, which generates 80 percent of the company's overseas licensing revenue. Sanrio will acquire all shares of the Mr. Men animated film development and production unit from London-based Chorion, the company said in a statement that didn't include the terms of the deal.

Mr. Men will be the first character set at Sanrio not created by the company itself, which was founded by President Shintaro Tsuji in 1960. Sanrio has licensed the images of Hello Kitty and other characters it developed for use on about 50,000 items, including Zara Hello Kitty T-shirts sold in more than 70 countries.

Sanrio "should be able to increase sales of Mr. Men," said Takashi Oka, a Tokyo-based analyst at TIW Inc. "Sanrio won't stop here and will carry on acquiring global characters." Sanrio's stock has more than doubled this year, making it the eighth-biggest gainer among 1,662 stocks in the Topix index, which has declined 18 percent.

Mr. Men is a series of 49 children's books by Roger Hargreaves commencing in 1971. Two of these books were not published in English. The series features characters with names such as Mr. Tickle and Mr. Happy who have personalities based on their names. From 1981, an accompanying series of 42 Little Miss books by the same author, but with female characters, were published, although nine of them were not published in English. After Hargreaves's death in 1988, his son Adam Hargreaves began writing and illustrating new stories, including four characters that R. Hargreaves had developed before his death. (The Japan Times)