'Webtoon' China Market Entry Online Consultation... Beijing Buyers $2.28 Million Contract

'2020 Korea-China Animation-Webtoon Business Consultation' Until the 11th This Month
Korea Manhwa Contents Agency Supports Market Access for Chinese Animation and Comics Consumer Market

The '2020 Korea-China Animation-Webtoon Business Consultation' is being held online.
[Photo by Korea Manhwa Contents Agency]

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Hyesook] The Korea Manhwa Contents Agency announced on the 7th that at the '2020 Korea-China Animation-Webtoon Business Consultation Meeting,' 12 domestic webtoon companies recorded a total of 47 consultations worth 4.37 million USD (approximately 4.9 billion KRW) with buyers from Beijing, China in the webtoon sector.

This consultation meeting is an event jointly organized by the Agency, the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency, and the Seoul Business Agency to support market access to the Chinese animation and comic consumption market.

This year, due to the global pandemic situation caused by the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19), the event is being held online as a business consultation meeting using video conferencing services centered on Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shanghai from the 27th of last month until the 11th of this month.

The consultation meeting saw participation from about 70 companies, including 32 companies in the webtoon and animation sectors, as demand for joint content production, platform distribution, and character merchandise development increased within China. Major Chinese content platforms such as Kuaikan, Comicfans in Guangzhou, and the telecommunications company China Mobile also participated.

The consultations were conducted through customized pre-matching between domestic companies and Chinese buyers, and to compensate for the limitations of the online format, online directories and introduction videos in Chinese were produced containing company profiles.

At the Beijing consultation meeting held from the 27th to 29th of last month using WeChat video services, 12 domestic webtoon companies conducted a total of 47 consultations worth approximately 4.37 million USD (about 4.9 billion KRW) with 22 key content buyers in Beijing, China. The amount of contracts in progress reached 2.28 million USD (about 2.5 billion KRW).

Through the consultation meeting, many achievements have been made, including contracts for serializing excellent domestic webtoon content in the Chinese market and IP (intellectual property) development, as well as the formation of industrial networks between domestic webtoon companies and Chinese buyers.

In particular, in the untact era caused by COVID-19, online business consultation meetings are becoming a new opportunity to pioneer market access for domestic webtoons worldwide.

Shin Jongcheol, President of the Korea Manhwa Contents Agency, stated, "As the added value created using webtoon IP expands into all content genres such as games, dramas, web novels, characters, and animation, webtoons are growing into the center of the new Korean Wave." He added, "We plan to actively support overseas expansion so that K-content centered on webtoons can stand out even more in global markets including China."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.