The author | Wenbin
Tencent has once again adjusted its content business segment.
On February 10, according to Interface News, the main part of Tencent Pictures will be adjusted from the Platform and Content Business Group (PCG) to the Enterprise Development Business Group (CDG). After the adjustment, Tencent Pictures spun off some commercial projects and will focus on the development of melodic works of the times, "not to make money as the first goal".
Before that, Tencent Pictures had actually undergone an adjustment. In 2018, in the third largest organizational structure adjustment in Tencent's history, which was called "930 adjustment" by the outside world at that time, Tencent Pictures has been adjusted from the interactive entertainment business group (IEG) to the platform and content business group (PCG).
However, although Tencent Pictures adjusted its ownership at that time, its core business did not change too much, and it was still part of Tencent's "new cultural creation" strategy.
However, unlike before, in this adjustment, some projects previously under the responsibility of Tencent Pictures, such as the second season of "Qingyu Nian", "Son-in-law 2" and related teams, will be merged into the Reading Group; Tencent Animation IP film and television projects such as "Under One Person" (movies and dramas) and related employees will be merged into Tencent Animation.
From the project to the staff, Tencent Pictures has obviously planned to make a complete split with PCG.
So, from the birth of IEG to the wandering of PCG, will CDG be the final destination of Tencent Pictures? After cdG and focusing on the melody of the times, what kind of story will Tencent Pictures start?
From the core of pan-cultural entertainment to the edge of new cultural creation
Tencent Pictures was founded in 2015, but the reason for its establishment began in 2009.
In 2009, Tencent Games has become the industry first in China in terms of revenue scale. But at this time, the marketing of the entire game industry is still in a very primitive state, beauty advertising, gift package gifts, point rewards, between major game companies, not only the marketing content is homogeneous, but also simple and rude, lack of creativity.
Starting from the game, Tencent at that time accumulated a large number of high-quality IP, but it was suffering from no good commercialization methods.
In this context, Cheng Wu, vice president of Tencent, put forward the concept of "pan-entertainment" with "IP creation" as the core in 2011, hoping that an excellent work will no longer be limited to the initial single form, but can derive novels, games, animation, film and television and other forms, and ultimately extend the life cycle and industrial value of a work.
Under the guidance of this strategy, Tencent quickly formed a pan-entertainment matrix with Tencent Literature, Tencent Games, and Tencent Animation as the core, but in this matrix, only the layout of film and television was missing.
By 2015, the enthusiasm for investment and financing in the film and television industry was unprecedentedly high, and the number of investment and financing events reached 139, an increase of 101.4% year-on-year. So in this year, Tencent Pictures was established and part of the Interactive Entertainment Business Group (IEG) as part of the "Pan Entertainment" strategy.
In the same year, Tencent Literature acquired Shanda Literature and The Reading Group was established. Coupled with the original Tencent Games and Tencent Animation, a pan-cultural and entertainment business matrix with IP licensing as the axis and a cross-field and multi-platform business expansion model based on game operation and network platform has been formed.
Tencent Pictures, at the beginning of its establishment, has covered many fields such as creation, publicity, IP copyright, and IP licensing. It can be said that the establishment of Tencent Pictures is to do the core and center of the entire "pan-cultural entertainment" strategy, but Tencent Pictures has not firmly established itself in this "center" position.
Because only two years later, with the popularity of the national tide and cultural and creative products, coupled with the traffic impact on Tencent's pan-entertainment field after the rise of short video platforms, Cheng Wu proposed at the UP2018 Tencent New Cultural and Creative Ecology Conference that it is necessary to pay more systematic attention to the construction of ip cultural values and upgrade the ways and methods of shaping IP. It also announced that Tencent's 6-year "pan-entertainment" strategy was officially upgraded to "new cultural creation".
With this upgrade, Tencent Pictures began its first turn, from the core hub of "pan-cultural entertainment" to the fringe figure of "new cultural creation".
From pan-cultural entertainment to new cultural creation, in addition to the broadening of product types, it is also an essential cultural upgrade. Prior to this, Tencent's IP development was mainly focused on extending the industrial line, such as an excellent novel being made into an anime, a game, and then put on TV and the big screen.
However, after the new cultural creation, Tencent began to develop more IP values of traditional culture, and injected traditional cultural elements into games, films and television and other content.
Therefore, Tencent's IP and copyright under the new cultural and creative strategy need to cooperate more with external enterprises. For example, in cooperation with the Dunhuang Research Institute, the whole industry chain has been developed with Dunhuang as the core IP; the Gulong Works Management and Development Committee has cooperated with the Gulong Wuxia Novel to adapt the comic book and so on.
In this process, with the diversification of IP and copyright sources, Tencent Pictures' voice in IP began to decline.
In addition, the new cultural and creative content is more presented in the form of animation, games, and online texts, which also makes it difficult for Tencent Pictures to play its advantages in film and television production.
Since this time, the importance of Tencent Pictures in the "new cultural creation" strategy has gradually declined.
At the same time, Yuwen Group, which should have begun to cooperate with Tencent Pictures, established its own set of film and television content production industry chain at this time, and began to replace Tencent Pictures' role in the "new cultural creation" step by step.
For example, in 2017, Reading Group established Reading Film and Television, which is backed by the rich copyright and IP resources of Reading Group and assumes the role of Tencent Pictures in IP management and operation.
▲From 2015 to 2020, the number of IP change authorizations of Reading Group has doubled
In 2018, Reading Group spent another RMB 15.5 billion to acquire 100% of the equity of Xinli Media, and since then it has had a new partner in content production that can replace Tencent Pictures.
From this time on, the position of Tencent Pictures has been somewhat embarrassing. After all, now that Yuwen Group has the largest IP resources and has its own content production company, Tencent Pictures, as an "external" collaborator, naturally does not have its own smooth hands.
From PCG, to the troika
The decline in importance in the "new cultural creation" strategy has laid the groundwork for Tencent Pictures to be transferred from the IEG business group, but what really contributed to this result in the end is a change from the video industry.
In 2011, Tencent Video was founded, and like almost all video websites (platforms) in the early days, Tencent Video was initially positioned as a video streaming platform, that is, to purchase content and then broadcast it through the online platform.
However, after 2015, due to the continuous competition between the three companies in copyright, the price of copyright soared. Therefore, since 2017, Tencent Video has gradually shifted from content procurement to content self-production. This transformation has also directly led to the relationship between Tencent Video and Tencent Pictures becoming upstream and downstream.
Therefore, in the organizational adjustment completed in 2018, Tencent Pictures and Tencent Video were naturally assigned from the IEG business group to the newly established PCG business group, and since then they have been separated from the reading group in terms of business.
The changes in the two positive camps also represent a complete change in the focus of Tencent Pictures, from the core hub of the "pan-entertainment" strategy to the simple film and television content development and production platform, and gradually faded out of the "new cultural creation" strategy.
In fact, at this time, Tencent Pictures, after stripping away the responsibility of the "new cultural creation" strategy, can actually be assigned to the CDG business group to focus on the production of the main theme content.
An important reason for not doing this at that time was because in the "New Cultural Creation" strategy, Reading Film and Television and Xinli Media, which replaced Tencent Pictures, did not really provoke the beam.
In June 2020, cheng Wu had just received the first semi-annual report of Reading Group from Wu Wenhui, when the operating loss of Reading Group was 3.556 billion yuan, down nearly 600% year-on-year. The core reason for all this is the impairment of the goodwill and trademark rights of The acquisition of Xinli Media, and the expected reduction of the cost of profit compensation under the set profit remuneration mechanism.
To put it bluntly, The performance of Xinli Media is too poor, so bad that it drags down the entire group.
Therefore, after Cheng Wu took over the Reading Group, in addition to fighting the "online text contract storm" as a firefighter, the most important thing is to help Xinli Media and Reading Film and Television re-integrate into the group.
At this time, Tencent Pictures, which was once responsible for the film and television content sector in the "New Cultural Creation" strategy, naturally assumed the role of this lubricant. This is also the second turning point of Tencent Pictures, that is, after leaving the "New Cultural Creation", it continues to contribute to the "New Cultural Creation".
Therefore, in October 2020, Cheng Wu, who had just taken over the Reading Group, kept saving a new bureau, pulling Tencent Pictures, Xinli Media and Reading Film and Television together to jointly hold the "Heguang Xiangrong 2020 Annual Conference".
At the meeting, the three companies connected 56 film and television projects such as "1921", "The World of People", "The Second Season of Qing Yu Nian", and "Under One Man". At the same time, the "Young Director Training Plan" initiated by Tencent Pictures and assisted by Xinli Media and Yuwen Film and Television was also officially announced, and the works of the first four young directors began to enter the creative stage.
This meeting is the first time that Tencent Pictures, Xinli Media, and Yuwen Film and Television have appeared in the form of a film and television joint production system. The "troika" that pulled tencent pictures' content production also officially made its debut in a group.
Cheng Wu's arrangement is actually very effective. Since the collaboration, the "troika" has successively launched blockbuster works such as "Qing Yu Nian", "Son-in-law", and "The World". Among them, the real-time ratings of the premiere of "The World of Man" broadcast on CCTV during the Spring Festival this year broke 1, and set a new high for the ratings of A set of CCTV TV dramas in the past 3 years.
These cases all show that under the coordination of Tencent Pictures, the run-in between Yuwen Film and Television and Xinli Media is very successful. Its final task in Tencent's "Pan Entertainment" strategy, the task of helping Yuwen Film and Television and Xinli Media to integrate into the group, was also finally completed.
This also has the beginning mentioned that Tencent Pictures has stripped off the business and employees originally undertaken in the "troika" as much as possible and handed it over to other brother units such as Reading Group and Tencent Animation. Because this means that so far, Tencent Pictures has completed its own phased tasks.
Tencent Pictures, to retreat into the advance
From the three stages and two turns mentioned earlier, it is not difficult for us to find that in the entire development history of Tencent Pictures, it is like a brick of Tencent Entertainment, and it will be moved wherever there is a need.
So from this point of view, it is not surprising that Tencent Pictures has been included in the CDG business group.
In recent years, Tencent has focused on social responsibility, and it is no secret that it wants to realize the social value of enterprises.
In 2019, Ma Huateng, chairman of the board of directors and CEO of Tencent, said in public: "We hope that 'technology for good' will become part of Tencent's vision and mission in the future." In 2021, Tencent announced in April and June that it would invest 50 billion yuan to launch the "Sustainable Social Value Innovation" project and the "Common Prosperity Special Plan".
For a company of Tencent's size, in addition to the continuous growth of its business, it is more important to gain social and public recognition. As a public relations behavior for the most users, film and television content is almost the best public relations channel.
And more importantly, Tencent Pictures is really good at it.
As early as 2018, "Melody of the Times" has become one of the first five cultural product series launched by Tencent Pictures. Over the years, Tencent Pictures has also continued to participate in the production of many main theme content, such as "Eight Hundred", "My Motherland and Me", "The Unknown Generation", etc., which have generated enthusiastic responses in the society.
These advantages are obviously impossible for Cheng Wu, who is also in charge of the group's brand public relations as Tencent Pictures, Reading Group, and Tencent Animation, to be unaware.
Moreover, what needs to be discussed in particular is that although Tencent insiders pointed out that Tencent Pictures "does not aim for profit" in the future, this does not actually mean that focusing on the main theme of the content will not make money.
In fact, since 2018, the main theme content has increasingly become the most important component of film and television content. Almost every year in the top ten of the box office charts, the main theme of the film can squeeze into the top five, and occupy a considerable share. For example, two "Chosin Lake", "Heroes of Fire", "Captain China", "Red Sea Operation", "My Motherland and Me", "My Hometown and Me", "Wolf Warrior 2" and so on.
▲ "My Motherland and Me" stills Source/Douban movie
The main theme of the film is more and more loved by the market and the audience, and it is also more and more box office appeal. At least this means that the main theme content meets the needs of the times and the market, and has sufficient space for excavation. The only thing that may exist is probably the problem of how the main theme content is combined with commercialization.
Moreover, due to the epidemic, the retreat of capital boom, the landing of stricter supervision, and the frequent overturning of entertainment stars, the film and television entertainment industry has already entered a phased adjustment period.
Before that, the film and television industry had actually experienced a period of hot money influx. However, after the end of this period, it did not bring prosperity to the film and television industry, but left many problems such as the cost of actors being pushed up, the emergence of a large number of shoddy content, the serious shortage of main creative personnel, and the rapid promotion of capital to lubricate the slope.
Among them, the most obvious change in the film and television industry is the sharp decline in the valuation of film and television companies. For example, Beijing Culture and Huayi Brothers have fallen by nearly 90% compared with their peaks, and even companies like Guangguang Media are now close to the peak of their stock prices.
Wang Changtian, president of Guangguang Media, once said: "Now there is a very serious phenomenon of 'triangle debt' in the industry, the theater owes money to the issuing company, the issuing company owes money to the production company, and the production company owes each other money and the money owed to the main creative staff." "And the rifts created by these problems also need time to be bridged."
In addition, as the regulation of the entertainment industry continues to land, mainstream commercial content faces more potential risks.
For example, on February 10, the website of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television published a notice on the printing and distribution of the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of Chinese Television Dramas", requiring the regulation of income distribution order, including actors' remuneration, to prevent the disorderly expansion of capital, and also to encourage positive interaction between capital and industry.
So at this time, reversing the direction into the main theme of content production is not a choice to shrink the sphere of influence, but a way to face the opportunities of the times.
In addition, even in the entire film and television industry, Tencent Pictures' combat effectiveness is not weak. According to the data released by the China Industry Research Institute, according to the statistics of works and box office performance in 2020, Tencent Pictures ranked 16th in the TOP50 of Chinese film and television companies in 2021.
Moreover, from the perspective of the composition of Tencent Pictures, even after handing over IP and some content creation capabilities, Tencent Pictures still has a business middle office including a content creative evaluation system, a production management system, and a publicity and distribution system, as well as a professional platform support line including process management, government relations, risk control and other functions. These capabilities just meet the needs of the main theme content production.
From this point of view, this adjustment of Tencent Pictures is more like a second chess piece of "retreating to advance".