Oriental DreamWorks laid off 40 animators and the number of employees has been reduced to 100

Oriental DreamWorks laid off 40 animators and reduced its number to 100 employees

In 2012, Chinese Cultural Industry Investment Fund joined forces with Shanghai Oriental Media Group, Shanghai United Investment and American DreamWorks Animation We jointly established Oriental DreamWorks in Shanghai. This animation company, whose LOGO features a panda sitting on a crescent red moon, also carries the dream of starting from China and moving towards the international market.

After its establishment, Oriental DreamWorks launched the first Sino-US co-production masterpiece "Kung Fu Panda 3" last year. The mainland box office exceeded 1 billion yuan and the global box office exceeded 500 million US dollars. , the results are very outstanding.

However, recently, there have been frequent doubts about the development of Oriental DreamWorks. "There are problems with the teamwork mechanism and cultural differences between China and the United States." Since this year, "Concas, the parent company of DreamWorks Animation, has Te is planning to give up 45% of its shares in Oriental DreamWorks," as well as the massive layoffs, which have made the outside world confused about the future development of Oriental DreamWorks.

As one of the largest Sino-foreign cooperative cultural exchange investment projects to date, is Oriental DreamWorks undergoing dramatic changes, or is it playing a new game?

A few days ago, Oriental DreamWorks CEO Zhu Chenghua accepted an exclusive interview with the Daily Economic News Film and Television Reporter (hereinafter referred to as NBD), regarding Oriental DreamWorks’ Sino-US cooperation, personnel changes, shareholder doubts and the company’s future development this year. etc., responded and answered one by one.

Personnel changes Are there any major personnel changes in the company? Adjustment is strategic optimization and upgrading

NBD: Some media have reported that Oriental DreamWorks laid off about 40 animators in its Shanghai company this year. At its peak in 2014, Oriental DreamWorks had more than 250 employees, but now it has dropped to a low At 100 people. Is this news true? Are there any major personnel changes?

Zhu Chenghua: This report is a misunderstanding about our layoffs or reduction in the number of personnel. Our shareholder Chinese Culture has also made clarification. In fact, the original intention of this matter was to upgrade and optimize the original production model, so the so-called personnel adjustment is completely a strategic optimization and upgrade. It turns out that we complete every aspect of production within the company. In order to optimize and adjust the development path, Oriental DreamWorks has determined the strategic positioning of "Creative Hub", focusing on the development of creative scripts for animation and related As for the core aspects of production, we outsource production globally for some non-core production processes. Therefore, in the optimization process, the number of our employees has decreased, but the overall scale is now maintained at more than 100 people.

NBD: Have the main core talents changed?

Zhu Chenghua: Our core management team is very stable. Xu Pengchong, general manager of derivative business, is a very high-quality talent in the industry. Melissa Cobb, head of animation studio and chief creative officer, is the chief producer of "Kung Fu Panda 1, 2, and 3". Zhou Peiling, creative director of animated films, has He has been responsible for the script creation and production of outstanding works such as "Mulan" and "Toy Story 2"... These core high-end creative, development, and management personnel are very stable and committed.

NBD: Which departments have been streamlined?

Zhu Chenghua: Many people are more concerned about our publicity team. In fact, our shareholder Chinese Culture has created an outstanding publicity and distribution team in the industry this year. Therefore, we do not need to repeatedly form a distribution team internally. We only need to retain the classic core publicity and distribution members, but in terms of the construction of a specific distribution network , we will no longer do it alone and will work closely with Chinese Culture. I believe this will have more prominent advantages than establishing a separate publicity team.

NBD: Our staff size is now around a hundred people. Will we continue to maintain this level in the future?

Zhu Chenghua: Yes, our number of employees obviously exceeds this scale, and we are still recruiting for many positions. The size of the team will be determined based on our subsequent business development.

Equity Questions Will US investors give up 45% of their shares? The situation of shareholders has not changed so far

NBD: It is reported that Comcast Group, the American investor of Oriental DreamWorks and the parent company of DreamWorks Animation, plans to give up its 45% stake in Oriental DreamWorks . Is this incident true?

Zhu Chenghua: So far, our shareholder situation has not changed.

NBD: As the first local CEO of Oriental DreamWorks, you have been CEO for about a year now. What considerations do you have for the future development of the company?

Zhu Chenghua: Our vision is to use Hollywood’s top technology, integrate Chinese elements, and integrate China’s localization experience to create top-notch animated films. It took Oriental DreamWorks less than five years to complete the localization setting, and it can be seen that "Kung Fu Panda 3" is a benchmark work in the entire field of co-productions. The Chinese version of "Kung Fu Panda 3" is entirely produced by Oriental DreamWorks , is a work that is more integrated with Chinese culture and more down-to-earth.

The success of "Kung Fu Panda 3" is a good example, showing the next development direction of Oriental DreamWorks, which will be more based on the Chinese market and perfectly combine Hollywood's top creativity with Chinese culture. This is what our fully localized team will now complete. mission.

NBD: It is reported that the cultural differences between China and the United States have always been a major problem for Oriental DreamWorks. Are there any problems in our cooperation?

Zhu Chenghua: We are now a team that perfectly integrates Chinese and Western elements. For an animated film of the scale of "Kung Fu Panda 3", Sino-US co-production would not be possible without close cooperation. And our next focus is to develop derivative business. We have very high-quality film IP and a strong derivative business team, and are committed to establishing strategic cooperation with top local partners.

NBD: What are the works currently in reserve and the release schedule of the company? What are the characteristics of these works?

Zhu Chenghua: We do have quite a lot of work development projects. Several of our projects are in different stages of development, and these projects are optimized after adjusting the strategic positioning of our "Creative Hub". Make paths to produce works. There are several mature works among them that we will hold a new film press conference to explain soon.

NBD: Are there any works to be released in the second half of this year?

Zhu Chenghua: We have no works to be released this year, because the production cycle of our movies is very long, and the production cycle of each movie is more than 3 years. Therefore, there are no works to be released during the year, but we have Forthcoming releases.