Licensing firms ready to cash in

By participating in the world's largest licensing trade fair, "Licensing 2006 International," in New York next Tuesday, vendors could boost their licensing revenues by more than 50 percent compared with last year, organizers said yesterday.

"Making a conservative estimate, we should be able to seal licensing contracts worth more than NT$350 million [US$10.76 million] this year," said Chen Chao-chen (陳昭珍), one of the principal investigators of the National Digital Archives Program (數位典藏國家型科技計劃).

The National Science Council, which commissioned the archives program to digitalize national treasures and artworks since 2002, will lead a delegation of nine vendors to the trade fair.

Last year, three local vendors managed to secure NT$220 million in licensing contracts.

"With more companies signing up for this year's show, we believe Taiwan will project a unique image representing Oriental culture and offering tremendous licensing opportunities," Chen said.

Now in its 26th year, the licensing show attracts big names such as Walt Disney, Warner Brothers, Sony Pictures and Coca Cola.

In terms of Asian participants, South Korea will showcase its digital gaming and TV dramas, while Japanese vendors will dazzle buyers with their cartoon characters.

China is not participating in the event.

According to Chen, this is the first year the government has sponsored companies to go to the show. In previous years a handful of local firms signed up to go to the show individually.

A "Creative Taiwan" pavilion will be set up with 15 booths featuring the National Palace Museum, the design firm Bright Ideas Design Co (頑石創意), licensing companies Artkey Art Licensing Center (藝奇藝術) and ePhoenix Networks Co (碩特國際). Content production houses TVbean Co (電視豆) and Caliber Multimedia Technology and Trading Co (嘉利博) will also be represented.

Among them, the National Palace Museum has been aggressively pushing brand and image licensing by tapping into its vast collection of 650,000 ancient Chinese treasures and artworks.

"It has become critical for museums to create stronger bonds between cultural artifacts and the public, and to bring `added value' to the national economy," museum director Lin Mun-lee (林曼麗) said in an interview on March 30.

Bright Ideas Design will showcase a series of "Children at play" characters based on Chinese paintings from the Song Dynasty through the Ching Dynasty.

Meanwhile, Artkey, Asia's biggest art licensing company, has been nominated for the first time for the 22nd International Licensing Excellence Awards held in conjunction with the show.

Artkey's Qi Baishi (齊白石) licensing program has been listed for "best art brand license of the year" and "overall best license of the year," making it the first Asian company to be nominated.