Norway’s Elias the Rescue Boat ready for the Chinese market  

Norway’s Elias the Rescue Boat, which has been a popular character in Norwegian children’s books, films, TV series, toys, merchandising since 1999 – already in 2011 the TV version had been sold to more than 100 countries, through the Muppet Show’s Jim Henson Company.

Chinese streaming service

Now, according to DN, Elias is on the threshold to its so far largest market – the Chinese. Oslo’s Animando, which is owned by Sigurd Slåttebrek and Alf Knutsen who came up with the original rescue boat universe, has after four years of negotiations sold the series to Chinese national broadcaster CCTV and streaming service Iqiyiy, the Chinese Netflix.

 A total of 52 TV episodes – 572 minutes – will be aired by CCTV, which has 1.2 million viewers, starting with two a day from 22 February (which is during the Chinese New Year, holiday time for most Chinese children families). In Norway the target group of TV viewers for the series  (children between two-and-six-years old) is app 300,000, while in China it is slightly over 85 million.

Biggest deal for Elias

In what Animando in DN describes as its so far biggest deal for Elias, the streaming service Iqiyiy, with a monthly 500 million users, has secured 543 minutes of Elias, including 39 TV episodes and the two Filmkameratene features, Elias and the Royal Yacht (Elias og kongeskipet/2007) and Elias and the Treasure of the Sea (Elias og jakten på havets gull/2010).

 ”We have opened the doors to the Chinese market – no other Norwegian children’s films have had a similar opportunity; the quota for international programming in Chinese television is microscopic,” explained Sigurd Slåttebrek, managing director of Animando, admitting that the CCTV agreement will not make the Copenhagen production company rich.

Five year contract 

Animando has signed a five-year contract with China’s Auldey Publishing, which will issue books based on the Elias series; they are also discussing agreements for producing Elias toys for the Chinese market with Auldey and BlueCat Champion Ltd. The latter estimated a potential four-year turnover for Elias toys to CNY 6 billion (yuan) or €0.8 billion (NOK 7.4 billion).

 A chain of restaurants with an Elias theme is also in the planning – the Norwegian-Chinese businessman, who has represented Animando since 2014, is currently in talks about a restaurant with Norwegian food near a new shopping centre near Beijing. – “As culture export the deal had a limited income, but it gives us so many other possibilities at the world’s largest market.” 

About Elias and Animando

 When Knutsen, with Slåttebrek, had developed the idea for Elias, they asked Norwegian author Eyvin Skeie to write the first book about the character, which came out in 1999 with illustrations by Jon Reimsæther. In 2002 Norwegian producer John M Jacobsen, of Oslo’s Filmkameratene, started filming the first 3D-animated TV series with Norway’s TV2, Redningsselskapet-the Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue and Norwegian directors Espen Fyksen, Lisa I Osvoll. 39 episodes were aired between 2005-2009 – during the opening season, 200,000 viewers watched every weekend, and the series received Norway’s first Emmy-nomination. Norwegian pubcaster NRK followed up with 52 episodes from 2014. Jacobsen also publishedeight children’s books and produced two features, Osvoll’s Elias and the Royal Yacht, which reached 240,000 local admissions, and her Elias and the Treasure of the Sea, which received the Amanda national film prize for Best Children’s Movie, and earned Gaute Storaas the Nordic Film Composer Award for his musical score.

Mascot 

Elias has since its early days been a mascot to Norway’s Redningsselskapet (which runs the Elias Club for three-eight-year-old children, and uses several Elias rescue boats in its information work). In 2010 the Nordland Theatre produced Knutsen’s play, Elias the Rescue Boat, directed by Ragnhild Lund. In 2014 it was estimated that the first TV series, toys, games, books and other spin-off products had generated more than €41.5 million (NOK 400 million) in Scandinavia. – Most recently Animando- Slåttebrek produced Norwegian director Simen Alsvik’s Anchors Up - Boats to the Rescue (Elias og Storegaps hemmelighet), the third Elias animated feature from a script by Alsvik and Karsten Fullu. Launched on 6 October, it follows Elias after he has been headhunted by the bigger neighbouring city of Big Harbor – he is thrilled and sets out to start a new life, leaving all his friends behind. But soon he realises that bigger is not always better: a local mining gang is mining a precious illegal metal that has the power to change the weather. – Germany’s Sola Media handles international sales.