Want to taste pure made-in-Taiwan animation work after being brainwashed by overwhelming US and Japanese efforts? First, catch a flight out of Taiwan.
"The local market is just too small for us to survive," Jofee Chiu (
Smec is a major animation production company based in Taipei.
Local animation companies have for decades been emulating other industries in Taiwan: by focusing on their areas of specialization in contract manufacturing.
Last year, the production value of the local animation industry totaled NT$240 million (US$7.05 million), and the figure is expected to slightly climb to NT$280 million this year, according to statistics of the Digital Content Industry Promotion Office under the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
This is compared to Hollywood hits, which obviously earn much more. The Lion King, for instance, easily garnered US$760 million in international box office, not including profits generated from related videos and peripheral merchandise.
In light of the limited Taiwanese market, local companies said they must target bigger overseas markets, like the US and even China, and hopefully bring their success back to Taiwan -- if they strike the right note.
One major reason why Taiwan has a hard time cultivating this industry is the content.
"I believe our creativity and technique in developing this form of entertainment are not inferior to our counterparts in other advanced countries," Chiu said.
But most of the time, local companies come up with scripts bearing too many cultural references, which are considered appealing to Chinese audiences or sometimes only Taiwanese viewers, Chiu said.
Grandma and Her Ghost (
To survive in the market, Smec Media & Entertainment decided to introduce its mini-cartoon series The Kids' Ten Commandments (
The successes overseas also interest local TV operators, which are negotiating with Smec Media & Entertainment in bringing the program to local TV viewers, Chiu said.
Another example of pushing the overseas-markets strategy is TVbeans Co (電視豆), an animation start-up established last year. The company in August signed an agreement with Japan-based Planet Inc and Fuji Creative Corp to spend NT$233 million to produce a cartoon serial, Panda Monium, in Taiwan. Taiwanese audiences will not be able to see it until a few years after it is broadcast in Japan in the second half of next year.
Jodie Lee (
"In fact, the high production costs of quality animation, averaging US$100,000 to US$300,000 per episode, make it difficult to earn money even if you target the whole world," Lee said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group