Award-winning producer One Animation announced a strategic partnership with CMC Inc. to set up 15 kids and family theme parks in China inspired by hit property Oddbods over the next eight years.
First up will be the Oddbods Family Entertainment Centre in Xian, scheduled to open in Q3 2019. Chengdu and Shanghai are also on the list of park locations. The first five will be completed in the next five years, each featuring bespoke attractions, live character shows, themed restaurants, premiums and complete retail program.
“China is an extremely important market to us and one in which we are placing considerable resources and energy,” said Pauline Hiu, VP Consumer Products Asia & LatAm at One Animation. “Our philosophy is strongly focussed on delivering compelling and engaging content, stretching the boundaries of creativity and technology to create fun and unique experiences for kids and families. As China’s leading Entertainment, Tech and Consumer Conglomerate, CMC Inc. is our perfect partner in this space enabling us to meet our ambitious goals through the creation of these unique immersive worlds of Oddbods entertainment.”
Li Xie, VP of CMC, commented: “CMC Inc. has identified a gap in China for parent-child theme parks and Oddbods is the ideal brand with which to fill it due to its significantly higher than average co-viewing appeal. CMC will kick off the first Oddbods FEC in mainland China, where children and parents can experience Oddbods in a fun, unique and highly engaging way. This is the first step in a potentially much deeper collaboration between CMC and One Animation, and a meaningful step in CMC’s location based entertainment strategy.”
Oddbods continues to hit major milestones as the brand develops. The colorful, comic little characters are now represented in 180 countries around the world, and have racked up 4.2 billion views on YouTube (including 1 billion in China alone).
The FEC deal was brokered by the ancillary business team at Pearl Studio, which is backed by a consortium lead by CMC.
