Boowa & Kwala

TV Kids
Weekly, December 18, 2007

ORIGIN: The animated series for preschoolers
is based on a highly successful website. The Boowa & Kwala website (www.boowakwala.com) is part of
the UpToTen.com platform, which, as one of the leading children’s websites with
more than 1,100 interactive activities available in a multi-language format, is
visited by children from 200-plus territories around the world.

DISTRIBUTOR: Granada International

CREATORS: Jason and Véronique Barnard

TV SHOW: Boowa & Kwala helps children to develop their own
imagination by promoting learning through music and song. The series consists
of 52 5-minute episodes, rich and colorful in design with original music and
fun educational stories.

SYNOPSIS: Boowa and Kwala are inseparable friends
who share many adventures. Helped by their two families—The Wawas, who
are modern and technologically savvy, and The Koalas, who are more traditional
and down-to-earth—they discover the world around them.

In each show,
a new activity is learned as the audience interacts with the two charming and
funny characters: Boowa, a big blue dog who has a great sense of humor and
loves playing, laughing and singing, and Kwala, a small inquisitive yellow
koala who is funny, full of energy and a little bit cheeky.

EXECUTIVE
PRODUCERS: Philippe
Mounier, Emmanuelle Namiech

COMMISSIONING
BROADCASTER:
TiJi/Canal J, France

MERCHANDISE: Sleeping bags, beach towels, DVDs,
music CDs, T-shirts and posters are available from the Boowa & Kwala website. Going forward, music-based
merchandise like CDs and ringtones will be key, according to Jason Barnard, the
co-creator of the show. “Boowa & Kwala is a very musical series, with one song in every episode,”
he says.

Also important
will be “children’s clothes and bedding; books, crayons and other
early-schooling equipment and toys and games for early education.”

STRATEGY
FOR ROLLOUT: “With a
property as special as this, it is important that as well as generating
revenues from license fees, we place the show with broadcasters who will
nurture the program and work with us to develop the property off screen as well
as on screen,” says Emmanuelle Namiech, the director of acquisitions and
co-productions at Granada International. “Boowa & Kwala started life on the Internet, so we go
to market with new-media opportunities already available. Our job will be to
make sure that the linear window contributes to the growing fan base and builds
opportunities for the property to grow across other platforms whilst doing a
great job for the broadcast partners that we work with.”

Executive
producer Philippe Mounier, from the animation studio P.M.M.P., adds: “Country by country, a merchandising
campaign will be launched during the first broadcast of the series. The ground
work made by agents will be supported by UpToTen.com on the Internet.”