The Chinese online group COL has officially announced the creation of a global content distribution department, with a pool of thousands of Chinese and English-language plays under its banner, to be declared “the world’s largest issuer of micro-short plays”. Over the past 18 months, the mini-short drama has seen a dramatic growth in the Chinese market and has recently expanded rapidly in the global market, a move by COL aimed at meeting the needs of the global market for rapid growth in the micro-short.
The United States audience has recently stepped up its focus on the content of the micro-short play, and COL has expanded its distribution operations with a wealth of content. Target clients targeted broadcasters, streaming media platforms, telecommunication operators and digital platforms to provide their mobile end-to-end primary users with debris-based entertainment content.
COL sets up a micro-short play industry-wide chain, which creates the original IP and operates its own short video platform, which includes FlareFlow, Sustainable+ and Unireel in Japan. At the same time, the company holds shares in the United States microstory media ReelShort parent company, Crazy Maple Studio, California. The 105 episodes of historical dramas under the banner of COL, ” One Scroll of Clothes ” , were viewed 238 million times a day, with users watching for an average of 77 minutes, and the cumulative number of broadcasts in China exceeded 1 billion.
The newly appointed General Manager for South-East Asia, Timothy Oh, will lead the expansion of the distribution sector. In his interview, he revealed that most of the dramas under the flag were of a scale of 90-120 and had a single series of 1-3 minutes. “Micro-short theatre platforms are usually commissioned according to content planning and United States projects are subject to audience and performance data assessment. COL, through its own IP (e.g., web novels) and platform-operated insinuations, accurately locates the type of story that divides the preferences of the audience, a data-driven model that determines our production decisions.”
Timothy Oh indicated that COL had sold many plays to Asia and North America, including platforms such as KukuFM, Vidio and TrueID. “Market demand comes from OTT platforms, app developers, telecommunications service providers and even traditional broadcasters, but market maturity varies from region to region. In South-East Asia, for example, we have observed a strong demand from OTT service providers and NRA application developers for rapid construction of high-quality content banks, which provide high-performing, market-tested content,” Timothy Oh indicates.
Timothy Oh also revealed that the expansion will continue in the future. He added that most of the plays were based on a non-exclusive authorization model in support of distribution by country or region: “For the top-level series, we may provide a first-run exclusive right for a limited window period, followed by wider marketing”.
Timothy Oh emphasizes that the core value of the micro-short play, which is “cost-effective and more accessible” than the traditional script, lies in “story tension and suspense design to drive viewing”. COL also plans to use the AI-enabled production process and has developed several AI-generated animated series.
“The short play is the language of a moving generation’s story: a fast, emotional, immersive, and immersive.” The company is integrating AI technology into the micro-short play production process to shorten the listing cycle.
