Paramount Animation

Paramount Animation is the animated film division of Paramount Pictures. Its first animated film The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water was released on February 6, 2015.

History
In July 2011, in the wake of critical and box office success of their animated feature, Rango and the departure of DreamWorks Animation upon completion of their distribution contract in 2012, Paramount announced the formation of a new division, devoted to the creation of animated productions. It marks Paramount's return to having its own animated division for the first time since 1967, when Paramount Cartoon Studios shut down (it was formerly Famous Studios until 1956).

In October 2011, Paramount named a former president of Walt Disney Feature Animation, David Stainton, president of Paramount Animation. In February 2012, Stainton resigned for personal reasons, with Paramount Film Group's president, Adam Goodman, stepping in to directly oversee the studio. It was also announced that The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water, a sequel to 2004's The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie and based upon the popular Nickelodeon TV show, SpongeBob SquarePants, is the studio's first film and was released on February 6, 2015.

In August 2012, in the same month that DreamWorks Animation confirmed that it will be working with 20th Century Fox as distributor beginning in 2013, Variety reported that Paramount Animation was in the process of starting development of several animated movies with budgets of around US$100 million. According to Variety, the intellectual property for these films is to be supplied by Nickelodeon among others and is to include Dora the Explorer, The Legend of Korra and Monkey Quest.