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Published on March 21, 2008

The move is intended to diversify their business away from being dependent on VCD and DVD sales and expand into other areas such as merchandising.

Jirath Pavaravadhana, vice president for business development and marketing at Rose Media & Entertainment, said the company had bought local licences for cartoons eight years ago.

The financial contribution from cartoons has increased dramatically from 40 per cent of Rose's revenue three years ago to about 60 per cent now.

The company has more than 2,000 hours of cartoons incorporating 100 characters, divided into pre-school animations from Europe and the United States, Japanese animations for children aged between five and eight, and Western animations such as "Fantastic 4", "Hell Boy" and "Casper".

"Our strategy is to buy all-rights licences for cartoon animations, including merchandising," said Jirath. "We want to transform ourselves from making and distributing VCDs and DVDs to manufacturing and selling merchandise of well-known cartoon characters, such as Keroro, Naruto and Magiranger," he said.

Jirath said Rose had its own TV cartoon programme, entitled 'Gang Cartoon', to be broadcast on Channel 5 every weekend.

The company has 100 shops around the country.

"We are going to convert six outlets into 'Gang Cartoon' shops, which, in addition to selling VCDs and DVDs, will sell licensed

merchandise and toys featuring famous cartoon characters. The first shop will be opened on April 6 at Central Airport Chiang Mai," Jirath said.

Legitimate operators in the industry are facing serious problems from piracy and strict censorship by local authorities, he said. Strict censorship encourages potential customers to buy pirate goods, which are uncensored.

He added that pirated VCD and DVD products control more than 60 per cent of the market.

"As a legal player, we need to implement the 'blue ocean' strategy and create new demand rather than the 'red ocean' concept and have unfair competition for existing market share," said Jirath.

Media Network Retail recently bought a four-year all-rights licence for the new Ultraman Mebius from Tsuburaya Productions.

 Samart Chuasiriphattana, managing director of Media Network Retail, said the company was interested in Ultraman characters because the market has plenty of room for the Japanese superhero. Since 2002, there have been no serious promotional activities here.

Samart said the company had secured all rights to the character. He anticipates the granting of merchandising licences will be lucrative. "To market home entertainment, it is necessary to think

about the total solution, which includes merchandising. We would like to market this legally," said Samart, whose Media Network runs more than 150 VCD shops nationwide.

Chanvit Vitayasamrit, chairman of Emagination, said the company had been awarded a local licence for the Doraemon character from the sub-licensor Phonex Communications, to be used as digital content, including still and movable graphics, games and movie downloads, to mobile phones and websites.

 The company yesterday announced a partnership with Advanced Info Service to provide downloadable digital content, such as wallpapers and games for Doraemon on mobile phones.

Takeshi Horiuchi, global business development manager of Phonex Communications, said Thailand was the fourth-largest market after Japan, China and Spain for the licensing of Doraemon digital content.

Chanvit said Emagination had opened branches in Indonesia and Singapore, where the licensed digital content of Doraemon and other famous cartoon characters as well as Hollywood blockbusters is expected to expand. Vietnam and Malaysia would be next.

Kwanchai Rungfapaisarn

The Nation