"Deep in the Bowl" "Deep in the Bowl"

Tencent Video, one of China’s most popular streaming services, has partnered with three European studios to co-produce original kids’ shows.

Here are the details:

  • Tencent Video has signed deals with Luxembourg’s Zeilt Productions, the U.K.’s Sixteen South, and the Sony-owned Silvergate Media, which is based in London and New York. The shows they produce will launch as originals on Tencent Kids, the streamer’s service for under-14s.
  • These deals are presented as the start of Tencent Video’s new “multi-year strategy” to produce children’s content with European studios. The company says it is actively looking for new partnerships and more content “for both domestic and global audiences.”
  • The first series to come out of the new deals will be Zeilt’s Deep in the Bowl (image at top), which will mix cgi and live action to tell the story of fish living in an aquarium. The comedy, which is based on French comics artist Nicolas Poupon’s Le Fond du bocal, is expected to debut in 2022.
  • Sixteen South is working an “original new 3d comedy series” and Silvergate is producing “an animated cgi comedy series.” Both are also set for 2022. Silvergate’s show has been picked up in the rest of the world by “a major SVOD platform.”
  • Tencent Video has already acquired a number of animated series from Europe and elsewhere, including Mighty Mike from France’s TeamTO, Danger Mouse from Canada’s Boat Rocker Studios and the U.K.’s BBC Children, The Ollie and Moon Show from France’s Cottonwood Media, and Claude from Sixteen South.
  • The streamer, which is owned by media behemoth Tencent, reported 112 million paying subscribers at the end of March — almost twice what Disney+ currently has. Its sister company Tencent Pictures, a growing force in Hollywood, is co-producing the forthcoming cg feature Wish Dragon with Sony Pictures Animation.

 

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