Imira Shores Up Sales Across Asia

BARCELONA, November 16:
Spain’s Imira Entertainment, formerly Icon Animation, has closed a number of Asian
deals on four of its animated kids’ properties.

From its third-party
slate, Imira has sold the 52×13-minute animated comedy Rat-Man to HBO Family Channel Asia as part of a pan-Asia
agreement. The series, a co-production between
Stranemani SRL and Rai Fiction, in collaboration with DQ Entertainment,
is based on the popular Italian publishing hit of the same name. Rat-Man is targeted at the 6-to-12 demographic, and each
episode sees the title character struggle between what he thinks he is—a
superhero—and what he really is—a mouse in tights.

Another third-party
property, Go!Go!Pig has been
picked up in Taiwan. Imira sold the TV, home video and video-on-demand rights
to the Olympic-themed series to Taiwan’s Power International Group. From
Italian producer Maga Animation, the 52×2-minute Go!Go!Pig follows the adventures of a comical pig as he takes
on incredible and dangerous sports, always coming out the winner.

The 104×2-minute
healthy-eating series Vitaminix has
been picked up by the free-TV channel RTM in Malaysia. The series recently
launched on EBS Korea, Mediacorp in Singapore and YoYo ABC in Taiwan, following
previous sales to Disney Channel Asia and Hong Kong Cable.

Lola Virginia continues to expand its Asian presence, notching
licensing and merchandising agreements with Empire International for Southeast
Asia that includes the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand,
Vietnam and Taiwan. The
series, targeted at the 6-to-12 set, has performed to strong ratings on
Nickelodeon Asia’s channels in Brunei, Hong Kong,
Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Palau, Mongolia,
Thailand, Cambodia, Macao, South Pacific Islands and Taiwan. It also airs in
China and Hong Kong with ancillary deals for home video and merchandising signed
for both territories.

To reflect the company’s
growth into new genres such as live action and new media, Icon Animation has
changed its name to Imira Entertainment.

Imira Entertainment is
looking to secure additional deals for these four properties at the ATF, and Christophe
Goldberger, the head of distribution and marketing, commented: “It highlights
the international appeal of our product that we can sign these key deals in
Asia in advance of ATF. Lola & Virginia and Vitaminix continue to perform very well in the region with excellent ratings
and we are delighted to introduce new properties Go!Go!Pigjust in time for the
Olympics and Rat-Man following
the pan-Asian agreement with HBO Family.”

—By
Kristin Brzoznowski