Viacom Nickelodeon CP in China

TOTAL LICENSING CHINA SUPPLEMENT

Consumer products, activations and collaborations for Nickelodeon in Asia Pacific

The Asian marketplace is an important one for Viacom/Nickelodeon and they are forging ahead with consumer product programs, activations and collaborations. To find out more, Total Licensing talked to Mark Kingston, Senior Vice President of International and Jack Yew, Vice President, Location Based Experiences Asia, Viacom International Media Networks.

To begin, we take a look at the new Viacom Nickelodeon Consumer Products group that brings together all consumer products across Viacom brands, including Paramount Pictures.

A Global Consumer Products Organisation

In May, Viacom announced the newly formed Viacom Nickelodeon Consumer Products unit led by Pam Kaufman, President. In her new role, Kaufman has global oversight of the consumer products business across Viacom Media Networks and Paramount Pictures. The unified, global consumer products organization will provide strategic focus to maximize

Viacom’s portfolio of brands and iconic franchise properties, including Nickelodeon’s PAW Patrol, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and SpongeBob SquarePants, MTV’s Jersey Shore: Family Vacation, Comedy Central’s South Park, Paramount Pictures’ The Godfather, Grease and Top Gun, amongst others.

Consumer Products is a key strategic pillar for Viacom President and CEO, Bob Bakish, and creating VNCP gives the company one voice at retail for ‘Every age, Every aisle, Everywhere around the world’. At the time of the announcement, Bakish commented: “Expanding and diversifying our consumer products businesses around the world is a key strategic initiative that will help drive Viacom’s future growth. The exceptional leadership and vision Pam has demonstrated at Nickelodeon make her a natural fit for this exciting new position, and her appointment will accelerate our efforts in building this important global business.”

The addition of MTV, Paramount and Comedy Central brands to VNCP globally feeds into Kaufman’s strategy to develop a diverse intellectual property portfolio. Long known as the number-one entertainment brand for kids and top five licensor; Nickelodeon’s iconic pre-school franchises

from Dora the Explorer and Blue’s Clues to the current monster hit, PAW Patrol and latest hit series, Top Wing are loved by kids and families around the world. The additional Viacom brands will allow VNCP to develop fashion and lifestyle programs for adults alongside its strength in kids.

Under Kaufman’s leadership, Nickelodeon already developed several cutting-edge collaborations with some of the biggest names in fashion, sports

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and social media, including Jeremy Scott, Carmelo Anthony, Vans, New York lifestyle brand KITH, (RED) and teen sensation JoJo Siwa.

In Asia-Pacific, Nickelodeon launched collaborations in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia for its SpongeBob Gold campaign. Additionally, streetwear brand, OXYGEN, launched a collection in partnership with Nickelodeon’s Nick 90s. The range included tops, hoodies, shorts and accessories for men and women featuring classic animated series Rugrats and Hey Arnold! in more than 100 stores across the Philippines. On the MTV front, Japanese fashion brand, XLARGE, launched a series of MTV coach jackets that incorporated T- shirts printed with logo graphics and embroidery.

On the pre-school side, PAW Patrol continues to be a massive global phenomenon. In Asia-Pacific, PAW Patrol was recognised as the ‘Young Property of the Year 2017’ at the Hong Kong Licensing Show, ‘Pre-School License of the Year 2018’ from the Australian

Toy Association and for ‘Young Property of the Year’ at the 2018 China Licensing Awards.

Creating ‘must visit’ retail-tainment experiences remains a key part of VNCP’s strategy across Asia-Pacific. In 2018, activations included: Chinese New Year with PAW Patrol: Year of the Pups – a number of Chinese New Year events in China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan, Thailand and Philippines with PAW Patrol wishing everyone a ‘Happy Chinese New Year’ in mall events that attracted thousands. Further activisions included Shimmer & Shine in South East Asia - Nickelodeon’s Shimmer & Shine journeyed across Asia gaining fanfare and publicity with launches at Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia; and Nickelodeon Playground highlight tour - the first-of-its-kind tour in Malaysia featured Shimmer & Shine, PAW Patrol and Blaze and the Monster Machines in one integrated interactive experience across five malls in partnership with Astro. Another key strategy for Viacom is to develop new opportunities to reach kids off-screen. From live events to hotels to themes parks, ‘Location Based Experiences’ is a growing part of its business. Viacom recently announced Nickelodeon’s first indoor theme park in Asia and its largest indoor park in the world in Chongqing, China, the

company currently operates Slimefest in the US, South Africa, Italy, the UK and Spain, and PAW Patrol Live! continues its run around the world.

Key Asia-Pacific priorities for 2019

Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – a complete re-imagining of the Turtles for a new generation of kids; the new series returns to its comic book roots with hand-drawn 2D animation, lots of humour and tons of action.

SpongeBob 20th Anniversary – the 20th Anniversary of Nickelodeon’s iconic character will be supported with year-long on-ground activations, on-air special episodes, games and a new app leading to a new feature film in 2020.

Nella the Princess Knight – Nella is a brand new heroine from Nick Jr and products will launch in Asia in 2018/2019.

Mark Kingston, Senior VP International

Mark Kingston talked to Total Licensing about the new structure and how bringing everything together under one organization will make a difference.

Mark Kingston, Senior VP International

Chinese New Year with Paw Patrol

The new Viacom Nickelodeon Consumer Products organisation was announced at Licensing Show in May, what led to the decision to form a single consumer products team? Mark Kingston: Consumer Products is an important part of Viacom’s business

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and one of the key strategic pillars set out by our President and CEO, Bob Bakish. Bringing all our Viacom brands under one unified consumer products organization gives us a single voice at retail covering ‘Every age, Every aisle, Everywhere around the world’. This is important because having a diverse portfolio of intellectual property is important to our future growth. The addition of MTV, Paramount and Comedy Central brands gives us the runway to develop fashion and lifestyle programs for adults alongside our strength in kids.

JoJo Siwa is a great example. JoJo was our first-ever influencer consumer products program, and what makes JoJo so special is we were able to build excitement amongst licensees and retailers without TV support. JoJo’s success was built from her incredible social media fanbase – the Siwanators – and we were able to amplify her popularity by incorporating her into the Nickelodeon ecosystem. With JoJo, we created a new model for future talent-led consumer products programs, and Viacom’s investments in the influencer space will help amplify this strategy.

event activations across the region serve as a benchmark to how we can communicate and connect with consumers in a fun and creative way. We saw participation increase more than 120% year-on-year, and these events are an innovative way we expose our content to new audiences.

Where are the key opportunities for growth across the region? Mark Kingston: We have identified opportunities across Asia to drive growth for our current franchise hit, PAW Patrol, as well as our portfolio of properties.

Shimmer & Shine in South East Asia

Nickelodeon Playground in Malaysia

Why is having a diverse IP portfolio important to your strategy? Mark Kingston: Nickelodeon is known for its iconic pre-school franchises from Dora the Explorer and Blue’s Clues to our current monster hit, PAW Patrol and our next big preschool bet, Top Wing, but we know a diverse portfolio of properties gives us more opportunities at retail. Our goal is to offer something to ‘Every age, Every aisle, Everywhere around the world’.

On the adult side, we already successfully developed several cutting-edge collaborations with some of the biggest names in fashion, including Jeremy Scott, Vans, and New York lifestyle brand KITH for Nickelodeon. Additionally, collaborations are also happening organically like Gucci’s use of the Paramount logo in its 2018 Fall Ready-to-Wear collection. With MTV, Paramount and Comedy Central now part of Viacom Nickelodeon Consumer Products globally, we can take a strategic look at how we grow our adult business.

What are some of the Asia-Pacific CP successes you are most proud of? Mark Kingston: Our Asia-Pacific team have done a wonderful job leveraging our characters to create retail-tainment experiences. We executed more than 70 mall events across the region this year from the hugely popular PAW Patrol Chinese New Year events to regular stage performances in Singapore featuring Shimmer & Shine, Dora the Explorer and SpongeBob SquarePants and the recent successful JoJo Siwa three-city tour of Australia.

Our strategy of continuous on-ground mall

Upcoming launches of new toys with partners Alpha for SpongeBob Squarepants and Hasbro for Top Wing will complement new lines from Mattel for Shimmer & Shine and Sunny Day, Spin Master for PAW Patrol and Playmates for Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

What are we excited about for 2019? Mark Kingston: Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a big one for us. Rise is a complete re-imagining of the Turtles for a new generation of kids. Audiences will notice the handdrawn 2D animation, vibrant colours, brand-new stories, villains and worlds of Rise will feel very different from the 2012 series.

The series launched in the US on September 17th and will launch across Asia-Pacific from October this year. We executed our most aggressive digital and sneak peek pre-release strategy in Nickelodeon history for Rise across YouTube, Nickelodeon channels, Nick.com, the Nick App and VOD platforms, and the series will receive the full muscle of Viacom behind its launch.

Over the next 24 months, we will expand the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Universe to new worlds and new generations through the launch of new content, new products & partnerships, live experiences and more.

Also big for us will be our latest preschool property, Top Wing, Sponge-

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Bob’s 20th Anniversary and, of course, continuing the phenomenal success of PAW Patrol.

Jack Yew, VP Location Based Experiences, Asia Viacom International Media Networks

Jack Yew, talked to Total Licensing about their locationbased experiences.

Viacom recently made a major announcement with the developers of Mall of China – Jiayuan Group, China Creation Group and Triple Five Group – to develop Nickelodeon’s 1st indoor theme park in Asia, which will also be Nickelodeon’s largest indoor theme park in the world when it opens in December 2020. Ahead of this opening, what are Nickelodeon’s plans in promoting Nickelodeon as a leading kids’ media entertainment brand in China? Jack Yew: Nickelodeon’s mission is to make the world a more playful place. And that means creating playful experiences through playful stories told on our shows, or creating playful experiences through location based experiences for kids and their families. As our business is diversified to be where our fans are, the Nickelodeon brand is frequently promoted across platforms. In China specifically, whether it is through Nickelodeon animation programs like SpongeBob SquarePants, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and PAW Patrol on children’s channel CCTV Kids and top video platforms such as iQIYI and Tencent Video, consumer products, gaming apps, live shows, exciting mall shows or promotional events throughout the year – all of which enable kids and their families to enjoy the experiences across different touch-points with both our brand and IPs.

In terms of Live Shows, in 2017 Dora the Explorer ‘Pirate Adventure’ live ticketed event toured 15 Chinese cities in the summer. This year, both Dora the Explorer Live! ‘Search for the City of Lost Toys’ and PAW Patrol ‘Race to the Rescue’ live shows are touring in China. In terms of Mall Shows/ events

– Dora & Diego Summer Forest Party at Nanfengcheng Shanghai, Sponge- Bob SquarePants Summer Carnival at Chongqing Evergrande CC Plaza, PAW Patrol Rescue Party at both Deji Plaza at Nanjing and at Nanfengcheng Shanghai.

How is the Asia business different from the rest of the world? Jack Yew: Our strategy for Asia is unique. Unlike the rest of the world, it’s the fastest-growing region for our business in Location Based Experiences. Our strategy is to establish Nickelodeon standalone exclusive theme parks and hotels in Asia where China is a major target market. With our rich library of IPs and content we are able to create immersive, fun and memorable experiences for kids and families. In addition to the Nickelodeon’s largest indoor theme park to be developed with the developers of Mall of China in Chongqing, we are also excited that the first Nickelodeon theme park in China is already under construction in Foshan, targeting to open by 2022. We look forward to sharing more plans in the lead-up to the opening of both Location Based Experiences in China. Separate from China, Nickelodeon’s 1st themed attraction in Asia, Nickelodeon’s Lost Lagoon, is already open as part of the Sunway Lagoon theme park in Malaysia.

How do you measure the return on investment for Viacom’s business in Locationbased Entertainment? Jack Yew: The Location Based Experiences business is still a small percentage of Viacom’s overall business, which monetizes content through distribution, ad sales and consumer products. The bigger point of return on investment for us is that it goes beyond revenue – it is how we deepen our relationship with our fans, viewers of our shows and new consumers we can reach. It’s a way to extend the brand. It is one thing to put our characters and shows on air. However, more often than not, people want to touch and feel those characters in a way you can’t do on screens. That’s the big return on investment for us. The time we invest licensing our IP equates to a deeper relationship with consumers who visit the parks and hotels. And over time, we obviously hope for this business to become increasingly significant, particularly in China and in Asia.

How does your partnering model work? And does it make it more efficient to go through a partner? Jack Yew: Our partnering model for both our Location Based Experiences and Consumer Products businesses is through an IP licensing model. While our aim is to extend the Nickelodeon brand, we approach licensing through a long-term lens and it is critical to identify like-minded partners with deep local market knowledge and who share our vision in creating quality and memorable experiences for kids and families Once that complementary relationship is struck, the synergy between parties is the catalyst to making the project a success.

Jack Yew, VP Location Based Experiences

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