Tooning in to Asia

Singapore, Malaysia, India and Korea are home to a slew of animation producers making inroads in the global kids’ content market.

Asia has always been a force in the global kids’ content-production business, but for many years it has been Japan, and its prolific anime market, that has made the most noise. These days, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia and India are all giving Japan a major run for its money as the region’s top animation producer.

Indeed, as a challenging economic climate has made international co-productions a necessity in the kids’ space, animation outfits across Asia are reaping the benefits thanks to highly skilled workforces, government incentives and lower cost bases.

Take, for instance, India, which historically has been home to work-for-hire outfits that could deliver top-notch animation for a fraction of what it would cost in North America or Europe. Today, Indian studios are being sought out for their technical skills—and for their ideas.

INDIAN SUMMER
DQ Entertainment (DQE) has rapidly emerged as a leading player. After building a strong reputation as an outsourcing studio for Western producers, DQE is now generating its own IP for both Indian and international channel brands.

For Tapaas Chakravarti, the founder, chairman and CEO of DQE, international expansion was always on the planner, even in the company’s early days. “We realized very early on that having a global footprint was the only survival strategy that would work in the animation industry,” he says. “Call it a gut feeling or pure horse sense; I did not start by focusing on the local industry at all—though it was quite nascent and waiting for take off.”

DQE took its first international steps about ten years ago, working with producers in Canada and France. Today, its list of co-production partners includes ZDF Enterprises in Germany, Moonscoop in France, Classic Media in the U.K. and Marvel Animation in the U.S., among others. “We got our foot in the door with selective global co-productions and there’s been no looking back ever since,” Chakravarti says. “Aligning with global partners has helped us to derive maximum advantage through economies of scale, and while there are no short-cuts and nothing succeeds like hard work and sincerity, we have been very lucky to find like-minded client-partners who have contributed greatly to our success.”

Fellow Indian outfit Toonz Animation, which also has a base in Singapore, took a similar route, beginning as a work-for-hire studio before developing its own concepts for local broadcasters and then later aligning with international co-production partners.

“During our initial years we were more or less like a ‘sweatshop’ doing the labor-intensive production in the process of animation,” notes P. Jayakumar, Toonz’s CEO. Positioning itself as a leader in CGI animation, Toonz soon found partners in the likes of the BBC, Marvel, Cartoon Network and others. “Our business model slowly evolved and we became financial partners with these industry big wigs.”

PARTNER PARADE
Both Jayakumar and Chakravarti stress the importance of having a roster of top-notch partners outside of India when trying to boost your profile. It’s a view shared by the Media Development Authority of Singapore (MDA), the regulatory office that has been working hard to boost interest in the Singaporean content sector. The MDA’s strategy has included sponsoring pavilions at MIPTV and MIPCOM, where Singaporean producers can network with potential partners. The authority has also negotiated treaties with its counterparts in markets like Canada and Australia to make Singapore a more attractive co-production destination.

The MDA has also launched an International Animation Fund (IAF), in partnership with FremantleMedia Enterprises, which has several initiatives to train local talent, and co-invests in the production of original TV series by Singapore studios for export to international markets.

The government of neighboring Malaysia has also made investing in content a priority, via the Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC). While MDeC is putting its efforts in a variety of genres, animation has emerged as a key sector. “Approximately 20 percent to 30 percent of MSC Malaysia’s more than 200 entertainment and media companies are animation studios,” notes Datuk Mohd Badlisham Ghazali, the CEO of MDeC.

Malaysian companies affiliated with MDeC receive financing, tax breaks and more, Ghazali says. This includes a fund of RM75 million ($23.7 million) to help local outfits co-develop and co-own original properties for the global market. The goal, he notes, is to “increase the number of made-in-Malaysia animated projects available for sale and acquisition globally and generate creative IP and creative and technical skills.”

Like the MDA, MDeC brings a host of local companies to content markets across the globe. MDeC highlight titles include Saladin: The Animated Series, a co-production with Al Jazeera Children’s Channel; and, from Inspidea, Boo & Me, a co-pro with KidsCo.

In Korea, it’s the government outfit Korea Creative Content Agency (KOCCA) that has been driving awareness of the thriving local animation sector. One of the territory’s best-known companies is Daewon Media, which has been co-producing with international partners since the 1980s. “It was Cubix, which was a co-production between the U.S., Japan and Korea in the late ’90s, which allowed Daewon to really take off in the international co-production business,” says Bul Kyung Kim, director of the international content division.

EAST MEETS WEST
For Kim, Daewon’s ability to deliver properties that will fare well in Asia as well as in the West has been integral to its growth. “For the Eastern market, it will be something they can feel comfortable with, and for the Western market, it will be something new and fresh. Through Daewon’s creativity and international co-production strategy, [we are] able to provide children a new style of animation, yet something they can relate to.”

Kim also cites Daewon’s abilities in 3D animation, an area that is proving to be Asian studios’ calling card in the international market. Indeed, investments in technology across the board are giving companies from the region a leg up when working with partners in the U.S. and Europe.

“DQE has invested heavily in developing real-time communication infrastructure across all our facilities, which ensures a seamless workflow and data sharing—so critical to meet sacrosanct [deadlines],” says Chakravarti. “Apart from technical prowess and a robust production pipeline, we now have behind us the rich technical and creative experience of handling various high-end productions such as Iron Man, Little Nick, Little Prince, Penguins of Madagascar and several others. Our teams have honed their skills and constantly strive to upgrade skills and technology to make processes cost effective without compromising on production quality or creative values.”

COMMON LANGUAGE
Singaporean and Malaysian companies are also investing in advanced animation technology to gain a competitive edge. But equally important is the ability of these companies to effectively communicate with international partners. “The talent is multilingual, speaking English and the common ethnic languages, with a growing proficiency in Japanese and Korean,” says Ghazali of Malaysia. “The country also has a friendly environment and shares a similar culture with the West.”

Nonetheless, co-productions are always a challenge, especially when companies are separated by cultures, sensibilities and time zones. “To be successful one must carefully consider and cater to the requirements on a global level as well as a local level,” says Toonz’s Jayakumar.

“To work internationally is not an obligation, but a choice, and producing together with a common objective is akin to a marriage,” says DQE’s Chakravarti. “You need trust, a clear understanding of expectations on both sides, a clear understanding of each other’s strengths and weaknesses, a defined scope of work and a well laid out prenuptial, in case the relationship sours along the way!”

Andrew Ooi, the managing director of Inspidea, has gleaned two key lessons from his experience with international co-pros. “You must accept and utilize the differences in culture, project needs and work procedures between the partners. And you must be yourself and let the kid out! Once you do these two things, the co-pro becomes a fruitful and meaningful business relationship.”

Ooi, however, admits that expansion outside of his domestic market has been a challenge, given the tremendously competitive environment today. “Apart from having to crash through the local content quotas in some countries, our greatest challenge has always been getting recognized as a unique studio with good track record in producing animation. Inspidea needs to stand out not as a big fish, but as a little fish that can do the job and still have fun.”

Daewon’s Kim points to the difficulties of catering to your local broadcaster’s sensibilities while also developing a property that will travel. “Buyers request properties that contain distinctive characteristics for their own market,” he says. “Creating a property that fits everyone’s taste is incredibly difficult, let alone the considerable amount of time and resources [needed] to develop such a property.”