<P> Middle - earth Enterprises, formerly known as Tolkien Enterprises, is a trading name for a division of The Saul Zaentz Company, located in Berkeley, California . The company owns the worldwide exclusive rights to certain elements of J.R.R. Tolkien's two most famous literary works: The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit . These elements include the titles of the works, the names of characters contained within as well as the names of places, objects and events within them, and certain short phrases and sayings from the works . </P> <P> J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, sold the film, stage and merchandising rights of those works to United Artists in 1968, who in turn sold them to The Saul Zaentz Company in 1976, which licenses them through the former Tolkien Enterprises, now Middle - earth Enterprises . United Artists retained distribution rights . </P>

Who owns the lord of the rings franchise