I assume license numbers are very rare and more common for older VHS models. But I know about it just from this forum. But apparently they were only listed on the shell and never on the packaging.
That generality of the VHS shell has always annoyed me a lot, because there could have been so much creativity there and the manufacturers only made minimal use of it. Towards the end of the VHS era TDK and Sony cornered the market a bit with color VHS, I know TDK had more colorful projects, that there were translucent VHS, or from an earlier period Scotch had some extreme shell releases.
On Video8 that creativity was considerably greater.
Even if the shell and components were generic, as you say, they could wind their own tape, but there could also have been Saehan, or SKM. You could already navigate just by the information on the packaging, it's so much more complicated to tell the colour of a VHS tape by the manufacturer than it is for audio cassettes.
I'm also a bit disappointed that there aren't more stories and scholarship on VHS when compared to audio cassettes. Of course Wilhelm has the most experience, but there are still so many questions.
You guys are probably the best bunch here who know anything about this subject, no one else in the world can help anymore
