The above chart shows the sequence of movies released by Disney (blue) and Pixar (red) and their worldwide box office revenues. The chart starts with the release of Disney’s The Little Mermaid in 1990 and goes to the two latest movies released by the two studios, Big Hero (Disney) and Inside Out (Pixar).
Pixar outperformed Disney with every single movie release since it released Toy Story until Disney’s Frozen. That’s 18 years and 13 films. However, none of Pixar’s films have outperformed the Lion King or Frozen (the chart isn’t adjusted for inflation, so the Lion King still beats Toy Story 3, as far as I can tell).
Disney wasn’t only in need for a hit making powerhouse for the box office’s sake, they also needed fresh characters like Buzz Lightyear and Nemo for their merchandise selling machine. The acquisition was also interesting because it made Steve Jobs Disney’s biggest shareholder. But the reliable hit making machine Pixar has never managed a success quite on the scale of Frozen – or the Lion King.