Competitive Landscape and Development Trend Analysis of Film Industry Chain Market 2018

White-hot Competition in Upstream Link

The upstream of the film industry chain is the production link, which mainly consists of script development, project establishment, and film production. At present, the film production link access threshold is not high, according to the "film management regulations" and other relevant provisions, the film industry in the field of production involved in the regulatory access measures mainly include the film production production qualification access license, the film shooting administrative licensing, film content review license three major aspects.

It is for this reason that the competition among domestic producers is fierce, and the number of movies produced each year continues to grow. According to data from the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT), in 2014, China's movie production was 758, and by 2018, the number of movies produced had exceeded 1,000, increasing to 1,082, with a compound annual growth rate of 9.3%.

The middle reaches of the film industry chain is the distribution link, which mainly organizes the film publicity and distribution work according to the film's acquisition of public release permits and release schedules, and completes the film's public release as well as the sale of derivatives. However, the different types of films make the domestic distribution field of the organization there are differences.

The distribution of domestic movies can be done by any domestic distribution company, while only two companies, China Film and Huaxia Film, have the right to introduce and distribute imported movies. Most of the batch movies are imported by private companies, which then apply to China Film or Huaxia for a quota and pay a fee.

This has led to fierce competition in the domestic film distribution market, with Bona Film, Five Continents Film Distribution, and other terminal-driven companies based on the dominance of cinema resources, as well as Ray Media, Xinli Media, and other traditional distribution companies centered on high-quality content production, and Cat's Eye Movie, and Alibaba Pictures, as the representatives of the emerging Internet distribution companies.

The downstream of the movie industry chain is the cinema (theater) link, which is an independent business unit in the movie industry that connects the movie distributor and the movie projector, and implements unified scheduling, unified operation, and unified management of the cinema. At present, the relationship between domestic theaters and their subordinate theaters is mainly divided into two kinds, one is the asset linkage, the other is the signing of the franchise.

Because of the license access barriers, the number of domestic theaters has basically remained stable in recent years, and the competitive landscape is basically clear, with Wanda Cinemas, Dadi Cinemas, Shanghai United, China Film South, and China Film Digital as the representatives of the top ten theaters echelons to become the dominant force in the commercial operation of China's theater market.

Industrial chain integration trend is obvious

At present, the domestic film industry whole industry chain layout or to the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain to extend the development of the trend of integration or cooperation is increasingly obvious. In order to integrate the whole industry chain resources to strengthen the profitability and control of the industry chain of various resource elements, in order to play the synergistic effect of the various industrial links, to enhance market competitiveness, the domestic film industry in the strength of the enterprise has begun to comprehensively involved in the upstream of the content production, the middle of the publicity and distribution, downstream cinema theater terminal projection and derivatives of the industrial investment, so that the entire film industry chain integration The trend is becoming more and more obvious.

In addition, the cross-border integration of film and television companies and the Internet has become more and more frequent, with the gradual Internetization of film production, film publicity and distribution, film derivatives, and projection terminals. In the past two years, Internet companies have also infiltrated into all aspects of production, distribution, and screening through mergers and acquisitions and cooperation, intervening in the movie industry chain from multiple perspectives and in a wide range of fields. With the leading edge of their platforms, Internet companies synergize their existing business layout and strategic direction to provide a rich content supply for the platform's active users and increase profitability.

For more data, please refer to Foresight Industry Research Institute released China Film Industry Market Outlook and Investment Strategy Planning Analysis Report.