Hollywood comes to China for summit

Over 230 delegates from 100 companies in China attended the inaugural Hollywood in China Summit, a closed-door conference with Hollywood studios hosted by Filmworks China, JWT Shanghai and GroupM China in Shanghai last week.

This invitation-only summit provided Chinese marketing directors with a sneak peak at some of the most promising commercial upcoming Hollywood movies, and a rare opportunity to talk directly with Hollywood executives about marketing opportunities linked to future blockbusters, including Transformers 4, Avatar 2, Fast & Furious 6, Turbo and the Hobbit Trilogy. Some of the footage shared with the audience in China marked the first time it has been seen outside the studios, worldwide.

During the conference, over 50 marketing directors from major Chinese corporations, including Yili, Suning.com, Changhong and Metersbonwe took part in one-on-one meetings with the producers from Hollywood’s largest studios, including DreamWorks Animation, Paramount Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Universal Pictures, Hasbro and Warner Bros., for preliminary discussions on product placement, licensing deals and tie-in promotions for a slate of upcoming films.  

 “We wanted to create an opportunity for brands in China to directly talk to the executives from most of the major Hollywood film studios about entertainment marketing and cooperation opportunities. It’s the first of its kind in China in such a scale – and the response from both sides was incredible,” said Eric Lee, Managing Director of JWT Shanghai.  “There is clearly a big appetite among companies in China to increase their brand profile by working with Hollywood properties.”

JWT and GroupM work even more closely with Filmworks China Entertainment Marketing, a Beijing-based company run by entertainment industry veteran Sirena Liu, who established Shanghai Branch early this year.  FilmWorks has negotiated several high-profile placements for Chinese brands in recent years, most notably for TCL Television, Chinese fashion brand Meters/Bonwe Group and Yili Group’s Shuhua brand milk in the Hollywood blockbuster Transformers 3. Recently, Filmworks China extended its reach into popular American TV shows, successfully placing Yili Milk into “The Big Bang Theory”, another breakthrough for Chinese brands.

The Hollywood Summit delegates got a taste of Hollywood glamour at the event, interacting with characters like Bumble Bee, Optimus Prime, Kung Fu Panda and Alex the Lion, from Madagascar. The delegates also had a chance viewing some confidential materials, including quite a few never-seen-before clips from upcoming films.

 “For most of the studios executives, this is the first time they’ve been able to showcase their properties to such a large audience of potential partners and clients, so they have taken the summit very seriously. They really put their hearts in preparing the presentation materials, and present the slates with passion and professions. As a result, the whole event presentation was fabulous, and audience was captivated,” said Liu. “We are very lucky to be able to earn the trust of these great studios, and bring their valuable properties to all the brands in China.”

The “Hollywood in China” event set a high standard in the industry for tie-in partners to review content opportunities,” said Dorothy Chan, Head of Licensing, Asia Pacific, Hasbro.

Bessie Lee, CEO, GroupM China, commented, “With our tremendous success with our Yili partnership with Transformers 3, we’ve shown that Hollywood films represent a huge opportunity for both local Chinese and multi-national brands to connect with hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers.  Few other media offer this kind opportunity for reach and engagement on such a massive scale in this market.”

Photo:

5th from right: Toni Qiu，Head of Licensing, Greater China