In North America, licensing rights had been given to both Namco Bandai and Atari. In 1999, Atari acquired exclusive rights to the video games through Funimation, a deal which was extended for five more years in 2005. A 2007 dispute would end with Atari paying Funimation $3.5 million. In July 2009, Namco Bandai was reported to have obtained exclusive rights to release the games for a period of five years. This presumably would have taken effect after Atari's licensing rights expired at the end of January 2010.