The Hengdian International Short Drama Alliance was established at the Hengdian World Studios in East China's Zhejiang Province. Photo: Courtesy of Hengdian World Studios

The Hengdian International Short Drama Alliance was established at the Hengdian World Studios, a major film production base in East China's Zhejiang Province, with the aim to seize the overseas short drama market.

Guo Shu, general manager at the international business department of the Hengdian World Studios, told the Global Times on Wednesday that the rapid development of short dramas is closely related to changes in global audiences' content consumption habits. 

"The rise of mobile platforms and the fast-paced lifestyle have made concise, efficient, and relatable short dramas mainstream," Guo said. 

She noted that overseas short dramas produced by alliance members have achieved a global box office revenue of more than $30 million so far.

The establishment of the alliance is aimed at adapting to this trend by integrating global resources and building a collaborative and efficient international short drama production and distribution platform. 

Guo noted that overseas short dramas will play a positive role in promoting exchanges between the Chinese and foreign film and TV industries, as well as in the career development of foreign actors in China. 

The domestic short drama market is highly competitive, and the overseas short drama market lacks high-quality production teams, thus offering great potential for growth, with short dramas being in short supply, as analyzed by Hengdian World Studios.

Guo noted that in addition to a core creative team consisting of international students and overseas Chinese, the alliance plans to actively invite writers, actors and directors from target markets to participate in the creative process, thereby achieving true localized filming. 

"While retaining the core of Chinese film and TV culture, we incorporate cultural symbols from the audience's region to make the plot more relatable to local life," Guo said.

In the future, the alliance plans to actively participate in relevant activities domestically and internationally, expanding into key markets in Europe, the Americas, Japan and South Korea, broadening its commercial cooperation network.

To better cope with challenges on managing the short drama production, the alliance also plans to launch a publicly transparent management platform to ensure that cooperation between foreign personnel and crews is professional and efficient and to promote the standardized development of Chinese short dramas abroad.

"The development of the short drama industry requires a balance of innovation and regulation. We hope that Chinese short dramas distributed overseas will be able to tell more wonderful Chinese stories to global audiences," Guo said.

The "2024 Short Drama Overseas Industry Report" released by duanju007.com shows that China's short dramas emerged in 2021. In 2022, platforms including ReelShort and FlexTV were launched overseas, marking the beginning of Chinese short dramas exploring the overseas market.

By 2024, short drama distribution overseas entered a new phase of accelerated development. From August 2022 to June 2024, more than 100 short drama applications were active in overseas markets, with cumulative downloads reaching 148 million and in-app purchases amounting to $252 million. Some popular short drama platforms ranked at the top of app stores in multiple countries.

Chinese short drama distribution overseas has evolved from the initial translation and adaptation of domestic works, to inviting actors from the target audience area to perform, and now to establishing teams abroad to achieve localized filming, with each step aimed at occupying the overseas market and overcoming the challenges of cultural adaptation, getting closer to the needs of the audience, as reported by VOA.