We contacted Tokyopop, Be Beautiful (Central Park Media), Kitty Media and Digital Manga Publishing regarding how the Biblos bankruptcy would affect their publishing.

Tokyopop informed us that it is currently too early for them to comment on the situation as they only received word of the bankruptcy earlier today.

Stephanie Shalovsky of Central Park Media stated, "We are sorry to hear the news, they were great people to work with. We're not certain what is going to happen with Biblos, but hopefully we're going to be able to work with them in the future. In the meantime there's no impact on our release schedule and what we're going to be doing." CPM publishes several Biblos titles, including Kizuna, under their Be Beautiful label.

Similarly, Frank Pannone, Managing Editor at Kitty Media stated, "Biblos was the leader in Yaoi romance and the licensor of our best-selling Yaoi properties, Level C and Skyscrapers of Oz. This will not effect the publishing of any titles that have been announced. The titles that we have already published will remain in print at least until the contracts expire. And then we will look into whatever options there are to renew." ...But, I'm Your Teacher and the sixth and final volume of Level C have already been printed and are due to be released this month, I Can't Stop Loving You is due out in July and October.

Rachel Livingston of Digital Manga Publishing informed us, "Titles already released we will continue reprinting. For ongoing titles like Our Kingdom (currently at volume 6 in Japan), we're not entirely sure of the status of those, but we're going to strive to pick them up regardless of who has them even if we have to deal with the original authors or other publishers."

From ANS:

Heiwa Shuppan Declares Bankruptcy:
It's being reported widely in Japan that Heiwa Shuppan has gone bankrupt as of December 5th. The publisher is well known for it's adult manga and pachinko magazines. Supporting the notion, several hentai manga titles distributed online through LEED publishing's V.Wave have been discontinued on the same date. You can view a list of those titles at the link.

The company was established in December, 1965 and maintains a capital of 10 million Yen, headed by President Kenji Fujiwara. Staff includes: 24 employees at last count. Debt is about one billion Yen. Magazines published also include some car tuning rags such as "Drift Machine And Super Tuning". Comic related magazines included "T.A.T.u Art Catalog" and "Hanshin Yuushou Special".

A 2 billion 142 million Yen annual turnover was last announced for the fiscal period ending in September, 2004. It's said the company's debt load rose from the purchase of a five story corporate headquarters building in November,1995. Struggling also with establishing a hit property, the headquarters building was sold on November 7th this year along with the copyrights etc. of several magazines. Although the funds raised through those efforts was applied to fight the debt, inactive sales continued. Bankruptcy procedures are now underway and relations are being persued with related companies to continue business.