Pocket Aces ties up with WebTVAsia to enter Chinese Market

Mumbai-based digital firm named Pocket Aces will soon make its content available on Chinese Portal Youku Tudou, which is a Chinese version of Youtube.

Youku Tudou is the result of the 2012 merger of Chinese internet sites Youku and Tudou, creating one of China's biggest video sites.  The company had a stock listed on the NYSE, YOKU before being acquired by Alibaba Group on November 6, 2015.In December 2016 it reported it had 30 million subscribers.

The partnership is based on a 50-50 revenue share agreement and will eventually see the Sequoia Capital backed company expand operations to Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia, Korea and Indonesia as well.

The deal will also see WebTVAsia taking care of marketing and promotional activities for Pocket Aces in China.

Pocket Aces’ three main content channels include Dice Media (premium long-form web series), Filter Copy (short form content) and Gobble (short-form food videos). It also includes intelligent plug-ins for common headline optimization, based on data analytics from multiple platforms, by granting insights into words, article lengths and so on, which helps writers optimize content for sharing. The format also allows for inline commenting.

Chinese masses will only get to see short form content including Filter Copy and Gobble on Youku Todou with specific sections for each. About 70 percent of the company’s revenues come from the short form series.

“We have identified Pocket Aces as the leading shortform content player in India. We will help them onboard their content and help with localization, including sub-titling and dubbing into Mandarin,” as told to ET by Desmond Ngai, VP, strategy & partnership at WebTVAsia.

The partnership between Pocket Aces and WebTVAsia has opened the doors for Indian content to be sourced globally. Pocket Aces is also in talks for collaboration with other countries as well.

Image credit: WebTvAsia