Disney invests $1B in OpenAI in deal to bring characters like Mickey
Mouse to Sora AI video tool
[December 12, 2025] By
KELVIN CHAN
Disney is investing $1 billion in OpenAI and will bring characters such
as Mickey Mouse, Cinderella and Luke Skywalker to the AI company's Sora
video generation tool, in a licensing deal that the two companies
announced on Thursday.
At the same time, Disney went after Google, demanding the tech company
stop exploiting its copyrighted characters to train its AI systems.
The OpenAI agreement makes the Walt Disney Co. the first major content
licensing partner for Sora, which uses generative artificial
intelligence to create short videos.
Under the three-year licensing deal, fans will be able to use Sora to
generate and share videos based on more than 200 Disney, Marvel, Pixar
and Star Wars characters.
AI video generators like Sora have wowed with their ability to quickly
create realistic clips based merely on text prompts. But a flood of such
videos on social media, including clips depicting celebrities and
deceased public figures, has raised worries about “AI slop” crowding out
human-created work alongside concerns about misinformation, deepfakes
and copyright.
Disney and OpenAI said they are committed to responsible use of AI that
protects the safety of users and the rights of creators.
“This agreement shows how AI companies and creative leaders can work
together responsibly to promote innovation that benefits society,
respect the importance of creativity, and help works reach vast new
audiences,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said.
Disney CEO Robert Iger said the deal will “extend the reach of our
storytelling through generative AI, while respecting and protecting
creators and their works.”
As part of the deal, some user-generated Sora videos will be made
available on the Disney+ streaming service.
Disney will also become a “major customer” of OpenAI and use its
technology to build new products, tools, and services. It will also roll
out ChatGPT for employees.
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 Children's advocates, however
criticized the move. Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay,
said Disney's decision to partner with OpenAI “is a betrayal of
countless children around the world who adore Mickey Mouse, Frozen,
and Toy Story. OpenAI claims children are prohibited from using Sora,
yet here they are luring young kids to their platform using some of
their favorite characters.” Disney, he added, is "aiding and
abetting OpenAI’s efforts to addict young children to its unsafe
platform and products.”
Also Thursday, Disney sent Google a cease and
desist letter, demanding that the tech company stop using Disney
content without permission to feed and train its AI models,
including its Veo video generator and Imagen and Nano Banana image
generators.
It has previously issued similar cease and desist letters to Meta
and Character.AI and has filed litigation with NBCUniversal and
Warner Bros. Discovery against AI image generator Midjourney and AI
company Minimax.
“Well, we have been aggressive at protecting our IP, and we have
gone after other companies that have not honored our IP, not
respected our IP, not valued it. And this is another example of us
doing just that," Iger said in an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk on the
Street. "We have been in conversation with Google, basically
expressing our concerns about this. And, ultimately, because we
didn’t really make any progress, the conversations didn’t bear
fruit, we felt we had no choice but to send them a
cease-and-desist.”
Disney accused Google of “infringing Disney’s copyrights on a
massive scale,” according to a copy of the letter dated Dec. 10 seen
by The Associated Press. The letter included examples that it says
Google's AI systems easily generated, such as characters from Star
Wars, The Simpsons, Deadpool and The Lion King.
Google has also been “intentionally amplifying” the problem by
making the infringing content available across its many channels
including YouTube, Disney said.
Disney said Google hasn't taken any measures to mitigate the problem
even though it has been raising the concerns for months. “Google’s
mass infringement of Disney’s copyrighted works must stop,” the
letter said.
Google did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
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