Chinese anime rising as country’s tech giants engage in cartoon arms race to develop or buy Chinese characters
Tech firms including Tencent, Baidu and NetEase are doing what they can to get in on the US$220 billion global animation market, while local cartoonists are winning fans by using traditional Chinese religious and cultural themes
Growing up in the Chinese port city of Dalian in the 1990s, Zhang Hongchang spent hours immersed in Japanese cartoons such as Dragon Ball and Naruto.
China’s home-grown cartoons paled in comparison to the many Japanese anime series on television and in comic books that captured the imaginations of Zhang and his generation.
Today, Zhang is one of China’s hottest cartoonists and at the forefront of a new wave of Chinese animation that is being driven by the country’s technology and internet giants. His latest hit comic – which stars a high school student who is also a Taoist priest with secret superpowers – has been viewed 160 million times online.
China’s tech firms are engaged in a cartoon arms race to develop or buy Chinese characters in an animation market expected to hit 216 billion yuan (US$33 billion) by 2020, according to the EntGroup consultancy. They are trying to emulate the success of Walt Disney’s ensemble, which ranges from Mickey Mouse to Iron Man.
A key to that effort has been the development of artists like Zhang, who works out of a studio in Hangzhou where he draws comics that are made available to readers on a platform operated by the gaming firm NetEase.
“When I started, I was copying Japanese cartoons, but slowly I got my own style,” Zhang says. “I had to spend a lot time getting to understand the Chinese market and what Chinese comic readers wanted.”