China Literature, a Hong Kong-listed online literature company spun out of Tencent, announced in a regulatory filing Monday that it plans to acquire Chinese production house New Classics Media Corp (NCM) for US$2.25 billion in a push to marry the former’s original content development capacity with one of the country’s top production houses.
Founded in 2007, NCM has produced a series of blockbusters, from “The First Half of My Life“, “Hello Mr Billionaire” to “Goodbye Mr Loser” (US$226 million domestic box office).
China Literature, which makes most of its revenue through its sale of ebooks, is looking to leverage NCM’s expertise in TV and film to help it tap into China’s massive literary adaptation market and high-quality video entertainment.
The transaction is currently expected to close by end-2018.
Takeways
– Tencent spinoff China Literature is fully buying film and TV studio New Media Classics for $2.25 b
– China Literature’s core businesses have plateaued and slowed down
– The acquisition is expected to marry the two’s strength in original content and video production
Editor: Nadine Freischlad, Ben Jiang