CATDOLL: China's three Internet giants' layout in the animation industry, Tencent's big investment

On March 30, Tencent held the UP2015 conference in Beijing. Tencent Interactive Entertainment executives and partners staged another "high-end" event. The official statement was full of passion and dreams. In addition, we can also see and associate something else. As a new media focusing on the animation industry and cultural and entertainment creative people, Sanwenyu will analyze the animation part.

Tencent: Net profit of more than 20 billion last year, animation fund of 50 million this year

One of Ma Huateng's main proposals at the two sessions shows Tencent's strategy in the cultural and entertainment industry. On the one hand, "We use WeChat and QQ platforms as connectors" and hope to connect all information and services. On the other hand, "the core of the content industry is actually copyright. The next step includes music, literature, animation, etc., which will become more and more formalized and more aligned with the world."

Tencent Vice President Cheng Wu has a "pan-entertainment" strategy. He said, "Any form of entertainment will no longer exist in isolation, but will be fully connected across borders, integrated and co-existing." "'Internet+' will give birth to an era of great creativity."

Tencent established Tencent Animation in 2012, and earlier this year it became an independent department alongside games, movies and literature. The animation section was the first to appear at the UP Conference, which shows that its strategic position is very high. On the other hand, the total number of works on the Tencent Animation platform currently exceeds 20,000, with nearly 500 contracted authors, 39 works with over 100 million hits, and the hit rate of the comic "Zombie Brother" exceeds 4.8 billion... The achievements are also worthy of praise.

However, some details at the UP2015 conference were very subtle.

First, in terms of investment in animation funds, Zou Zhengyu, general manager of Tencent Animation Business Department, said that this year the company plans to invest "30 million animation fund" and "20 million comics fund" to expand the number of animated works from 5 last year to 15.

You should know that Tencent's total revenue in 2014 was 78.932 billion yuan, and its net profit based on generally accepted accounting principles was 23.816 billion yuan.

Second, Tencent's film department is in charge of major films such as "QQ Speed" and "Zombie Brothers". The cross-media star IP creation plan for "Brave Adventure" is currently centered on the game department.

Third, just after the declaration of "the dream of revitalizing Chinese comics will definitely come true" was made in the morning, another group of people announced in the afternoon that "the big IP strategy of "Monster Hunter OL" has been launched" and that they would promote the fan culture of "Naruto". (Yes, Naruto, who can talk to people at the scene, also appeared at the conference)

Maybe you have discovered more peculiarities. The focus of Tencent's conference this time is more likely to be the 11 mobile games announced at the conference, as well as the ambition of China Literature Group, which has merged with Shanda Literature and "unified the world", to enter the "national reading" in online literature. In the eyes of many people, animation is a business that is too far from making money, and some people even think it is an accessory to games and movies. Whether this view can be changed is a long and arduous journey, and more KPIs need to be achieved.

Tencent's new mobile game list gives people a sense of déjà vu after last year's UP2014, when Baidu, Xiaomi and other channels also came to the platform to join forces with Tencent to encircle 360. This year, some analysts believe that Tencent is encircling competitors in mobile game channels and game development and distribution from the perspective of IP and CP cooperation - Tencent has released mobile games such as "Hero Killer", "Protect Carrot 3", "Miracle Nikki", "Stone Age", "Dungeon & Warriors", "Infinity Blade", and "Naruto", as well as a mysterious product codenamed 1.76, which a game media person revealed is a Shanda legendary mobile game. These masterpieces cover subcategories such as flight shooting, casual puzzles, board games, dress-up development, and horizontal fighting, and the cooperative CPs also involve many well-known developers.

Alibaba: The entertainment empire of buying, selling and selling

Jack Ma has been preaching something new recently. He said that the world is in the era of moving from IT to DT (Data Technology). "The biggest challenge in the DT era is how to develop the Internet economy and perfectly combine and integrate traditional industries with IT." In this transformation, Jack Ma believes that small Internet companies must continue to innovate and abide by the rules, while large Internet companies must not only innovate, but also create and upgrade rules.

In the entertainment industry, Alibaba creates rules by buying from other companies and selling its own business and financial platforms.

In digital music, it acquired Tiantian Dongting and Xiami Music and reorganized them into Alibaba Music; in film and television industry, it invested HK$6.244 billion in China Culture Media, which was later renamed Alibaba Pictures. In addition, it also acquired shares in Huayi Brothers, holding 8.08% of the shares, tied with Tencent, and purchased 8.8% of the shares of Light Media for 2.4 billion yuan; in video websites, it acquired 18.5% of Youku Tudou's shares for US$1.22 billion; in social platforms, it has investments in Sina Weibo and Momo.

Users of animation content watch animation on Youku Tudou, watch animated films produced or distributed by Guangguang Huayi, and consume on Taobao Tmall Yulebao and Meituan Maoyan. It doesn’t matter whether the audience reads the same works of Jian Wang San or COSes the Black and White Impermanence in The Bad Guys, as long as they trade books and COS clothes on Taobao, and it’s even better if they can spend money on Yulebao. Alibaba, a big money sponsor, builds its advantages in content production and distribution channels in this way. How effective it is will take more time to verify, but this logic of buying, selling and selling coincides with Tencent’s idea of ​​entering the entertainment industry based on QQ and WeChat platform users, which is to some extent the same emphasis on content and channels.

Baidu: Robin Li is a scientist

With its search engine, Tieba, 91 and other tools and communities, as well as iQiyi, Baidu is extremely powerful in terms of channels. However, we have not seen it make as big moves in content as Tencent and Alibaba in the entertainment industry.

"Baidu Animation" is actually a copyright intermediary platform (different from Baidu Animation Channel), which mainly targets Japanese and Korean companies and charges a handling fee when a transaction is reached. According to media reports, "Baidu will establish a professional website that provides intermediary services for the commercialization of animation images. It will publish the conditions such as products and prices proposed by overseas animation companies and TV stations that hope to sell copyrights in China, and at the same time recruit Chinese companies that hope to manufacture and sell related products such as models and toys. The plans of both parties will be matched through the Internet to facilitate transactions." "In addition, it will provide advice on China's legal system and business practices, and provide services to remove animation image products from search results when they are sold on the Internet outside the agreement."

At the two sessions, Robin Li proposed the "China Brain", which aims to use technology to simulate human brain thinking. He suggested setting up a national-level China Brain, "with intelligent human-computer interaction, big data analysis and prediction, autonomous driving, intelligent medical diagnosis, intelligent drones, military and civilian robotics technology as important research areas; supporting capable companies to build artificial intelligence basic resources and public service platforms". Recently, he had a dialogue with Bill Gates of Microsoft and Elon Musk of Tesla at the Boao Forum to discuss topics such as artificial intelligence, driverless technology, innovation and sustainable development.

Perhaps for scientist Robin Li, the potential next-generation entry point such as the Internet of Vehicles is much more interesting and important than the entertainment industry.