Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. (simply known as Hanna-Barbera and also referred to as H-B Enterprises, H-B Production Company and Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc.) is an American animation studio that serves as a division of Warner Bros. Animation. It was founded in 1957 by former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer animation directors and Tom and Jerry creators William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. For more than three decades in the mid-20th century, it was a prominent force in American television animation.
The studio is known for creating a wide variety of popular animated characters and throughout the next 30 years, it produced a succession of cartoon shows, including The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, The Jetsons, Wacky Races, Scooby-Doo and The Smurfs. Hanna and Barbera together won seven Academy Awards, a Governors Award, eight Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe Award and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for their achievements and were also inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1993.
In 1966, with H-B firmly established as a successful company, Hanna, Barbera and original investor George Sidney sold it to Taft Broadcasting Co., of which it continued to operate as a subsidiary for the next quarter-century. Hanna-Barbera's fortunes declined in the mid-1980s when the profitability of Saturday morning cartoons was eclipsed by weekday afternoon syndication. In late 1991, the studio was purchased from Taft (by then renamed Great American Broadcasting) by Turner Broadcasting System, who used much of its back catalog as programming for its new channel, Cartoon Network.
After Turner purchased the company, Hanna and Barbera continued to serve as creative consultants and mentors. The studio became a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Animation in 1996, following the Turner and Time Warner merger, and would be absorbed into that company before Hanna's death in 2001. In 2005, Hanna and Barbera were honored by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences with a wall sculpture of themselves and their characters at the Television Academy's Hall of Fame Plaza.
Cartoon Network Studios continued the projects for the channel's output. Barbera went on to work for Warner Bros. Animation until he died in 2006. As of 2018, the studio exists as an in-name-only unit used to market properties and productions associated with the Hanna-Barbera library, specifically its "classic" works.