China’s Bilibili, France’s ADN Unveil New Co-Production Model, Announce ‘Hero Killer’ With Passion Paris

The Shanghai-based online video platform, producer, and distributor Bilibili announced a new co-production partnership with France’s Animation Digital Network (ADN) at a panel hosted during the Annecy Animation Festival on Thursday, June 24.

Expanding on the existing partnership between the two platforms to bring Bilibili titles to ADN, presenter Max Wang, a producer at Bilibili, called the new initiative a way to “bring the best Chinese and French studios together.”

Wang said that the first two titles to be part of this co-production partnership are the previously hinted-at adaptation of the South Korean Webtoon Hero Killer, as well as the already announced romance The First Frost, with both shows offering debut glimpses during the panel.

The “two-layer partnership model,” as producer Wang puts it, is intended to jointly source “high-potential international IPs,” with core financing provided by Bilibili and ADN alongside regional partners.

This international focus was a key part of both the partnership and the panel as a whole. Wang said of Bilibili that “we don’t have boundaries about the nationality of the IP.” Following the announcement, creators from both productions took the stage to discuss their work.

Hero Killer director David Pagaille spoke about being introduced to the original comic by the show’s producers at Passion Paris, describing the action-focused story of revenge as connected to his love of anime growing up.

While showing character drawings and expression sheets, Pagaille also opened up an interesting discussion about the globalization of the art style associated with anime. He wanted to make something “culturally linked” to France through that country’s enthusiasm for anime and manga, while also paying homage to the work he grew up loving. In doing this, there was “a question of appropriation that I needed to face in the process,” he said. Because Hero Killer is based on a South Korean comic, that question became “a little bit less complicated,” allowing him to synthesize a range of international influences.

The First Frost director Dong Yi also spoke about his passion for anime, particularly Pokémon, before discussing the contrasting style of his own series, which focuses on smaller, character-driven moments.

Before discussing the new projects, the Bilibili team gave an overview of the producer and video streamer’s growth, highlighting its position as “one of the leading video communities for young people” in China. “We are their playground,” host Yue Kang said of the platform’s relationship with Gen Z.

Starting as an anime fan community, the site has since grown into a “full-cycle content and fandom system,” with more than 3,000 acquired titles, and has become the largest platform for licensed anime in China. It later expanded into production, taking part in more than 80 production committees and producing more than 300 titles, or roughly 50 to 60 annually, since 2017, according to Kang. Most of those productions target young audiences.

Available in China, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Singapore, and Malaysia, Bilibili’s programming reaches more than 376 million monthly average users, with an average daily screen time of 119 minutes, according to the company. Partnerships with companies including Disney, Kadokawa, and Aniplex have helped expand its global reach.

The team also described several initiatives run by Bilibili, including the Bilibili Universe Award, a long-form IP incubation program that has helped artists develop projects from shorts to commercials, television series, and feature films. One example is the short animation False Memory, whose upcoming series adaptation debuted an eye-catching new trailer that, like the original short, recalls the boundless energy of FLCL.

Also discussed was Capsules, an anthology series that has run annually for four seasons, commissioning more than 45 original short films that have collectively surpassed 100 million views between 2022 and 2026.

Finally, the company highlighted the Three Body Global Creator Project, a six-part anthology spin-off of the animated series The Three-Body Problem, with episodes running between 15 and 30 minutes. Bilibili described Three Body as its biggest animation IP, one that “gives [Bilibili] the ground to present a sci-fi world that relates to everyone.” The anthology is representative of the panel as a whole: a call for artists and creators around the world to collaborate.