Tag Archives: business

Super RTL and Gulli Licensing join forces to ‘make a difference to the European licensing industry’

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The European children’s entertainment specialists, Super RTL and Gulli Licensing and Business are to join forces to support and develop ‘strong licensing programmes on each side of the Rhine,’ in a partnership that aims to offer licensors, licensees, and retailers ‘a unique approach to consumer products.’

Dino Ranch will be the first IP to integrate the joint the initiative and will be the focus of a licensed consumer products programme supported by both Super RTL and Gulli, building upon the master toy programme with Jazwares to secure further ‘best in class licensees.’

Super RTL is recognised as the leading content provider for kids in Germany, while Gulli is a leader in the French market.

“Super RTL and Gulli share the same DNA; we are kids and family-centric. We have a unique connection to children and families and know how to address them,” said Hendrik Rinsche, head of merchandising and licensing at Super RTL.

“Both of us have developed an ecosystem of meaningful touchpoints around strong content, smartly linked and absolutely capable of building successful kids’ franchises. The combined Gross domestic product of Germany and France marks 50 per cent of the entire EU.

“This collaboration is clearly a unique offer to our partners on any side of the business: Licensors, Licensees as well as Retailers. Our mission is to create incremental business for our partners and make a difference in the European licensing market.”

Jean-René Aucouturier, Gulli sales and business development director, added: “We are really thrilled to partner with Super RTL whose reputation is so well established in GAS and being an international benchmark for third party franchise building and management.

“In France, we have developed a strong record of accomplishments as brand accelerator. Combining it, with the SUPER RTL Consumer Products program development and experience is the best way for us to bring a strong added value to the French licensing market.”

Bits and Pixels revamps website to showcase company’s evolution into events and influencers

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The video game and geek culture licensing and brand extension agency, Bits and Pixels has revamped its website to reflect the evolution of the company and its expanded business into event production and influencer recruitment.

Founded in 2016, Bits and Pixels set out initially to provide a specialised brand extension service to video game developers and publishers. Over the past five years, the outfit has worked for a number of industry icons including Bungie, Capcom, Blizzard Entertainment, Re-Logic, and Wargaming.

Over the past 18 months, Bits and Pixels has expanded into new terrain, taking on event production projects and influencer recruitment briefs from a broadening array of clients.

“We wanted to redesign our website to reflect that evolution and to more clearly communicate the fact that we are working with clients both in the games industry and on the periphery of it, whether it’s fashion, telecoms, fast food or tech. The common goal of all our clients is to engage the gamer audience and we are doing that now in more ways than ever before,” said Su-Yina Farmer, co-director, Bits and Pixels.

Sandra Arcan, co-director, Bits and Pixels, added: “We love the fact that we still maintain our identity as a video game sector specialist but have added what we see as very complimentary services to the core of licensing and brand collabs. We have the experience and a great resource network which allows us to confidently expand our agency proposition in a way which allows us to work with existing clients in more diverse ways and start new, exciting partnerships with brands who aim to be more relevant and front of mind for gamers.”

You can check out their redesigned website here: www.bitsandpixels.agency

Emoji renews slate of US licensing partners as Retail Monster continues to grow the brand

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The Emoji Company has renewed a slate of US licensees across apparel, accessories, health and beauty, and fabrics in a sweep of deals brokered by the brand’s North American licensing agent, Retail Monster LLC.

Under the renewed partnerships, Emoji licensed product will continue to be developed and rolled-out by ASO, American Marketing Enterprises and Briefly Stated, David’s Textiles, Decopac, and Isaac Morris Limited, ensuring the brand’s continued presence in sleepwear, fabric, cake decorations, apparel, and more.

Michael Connolly, founder and CEO of Retail Monster, said: “The Emoji brand has proven universal, with Emoji licensed products having become staples at across retail and e-commerce 365 days a year. Even in a year full of uncertainty, Emoji- the Iconic Brand and our partners continue to deliver.”

Marco Huesges, founder and CEO of the Emoji Company, added: “We have the strongest and most collaborative partners in the business. Each of these partners has been committed to ongoing innovation and new product development, and has had best selling SKUs for years across retail. Coupled with our extensive portfolio of Emoji – the Iconic Brand licensees, we remain confident the best is yet to come.”

These renewal partners are part of a stable of licensees, which includes: Alcove (Vitamins); Aristocrat (Gaming); Bentex Group, inc. (Kids apparel); EVZ Inc. (E-commerce); Fast Forward (bags), Handcraft (underwear), and more. In addition to these US licensees, Peter Noonan of NPZ Consulting Inc. works in tandem with Retail Monster to oversee the brand’s Canadian licensees.

Partners in the Canadian market include Brand Partners Group, Centura, Isaac Morris, Regal Confections, and more.

Family fortunes | The Insights Family talks its ‘game changing’ Portal 4.0 and the ever growing business of family market intelligence

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This week witnessed some pretty major new developments for the kids’, parents, and family market intelligence outfit, The Insights People, which not only revealed its re-branding to The Insights Family, but also welcomed its new chairman – in the form of Simon White – and unveiled its ‘game-changing’ new client tool and platform, the Portal 4.0.

In line with the sweeping changes across the children’s and parents’ media and entertainment landscape, The Insights Family’s new platform now holds proprietary data collected from surveying over half a million children and parents across 17 countries every year, providing over 600 million data points for its customers to view, filter, and analyse. By anyone’s standards, that’s a lot of data.

Here, Licensing.biz catches up with Nick Richardson, founder and CEO of The Insights Family to explore the trails being blazed and the paths being carved by a Manchester start-up that over the course of the last four years, has made its international presence well and truly felt.

To kick us off, Nick, can you give us a bit of background on yourself and how The Insights Family came to be?

I grew up in Manchester and graduated Manchester Metropolitan University with a degree in Marketing Management. As part of that degree, I had a placement with Mattel Toys – where I worked on the Hot Wheels, Matchbox and Tyco brands.

After graduating, I worked in senior marketing and commercial roles for brands and agencies such as ExxonMobil, Momentum Worldwide (part of IPG group), Just Marketing (now CSM Sport & Entertainment), Hilton Hotels, Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, and PennWell (now Clarion Events).

As a marketer, I have always been naturally curious and creative – and have worked closely with data. I have had several roles where I was responsible for auditing existing research, developing research, and using this information to redevelop commercial strategies.

After 10 years of living in and around London, I decided to move back to Manchester. When I returned to the city, I enrolled on an Executive MBA course. During this course I started to see an opportunity to develop a disruptive and highly innovative research business which could be scalable, so I started to look at which industries were lacking data and insights.

During a catch-up meeting with SuperAwesome’s Matt Lester, who I had worked with while leading Hilton Hotels F1 sponsorship, it became very apparent that kids’ lives were unrecognisable from when I worked at Mattel in 2002/2003.

However, the ways in which companies were approaching their marketing had not really changed. Companies who operated in this space needed help and support to understand what was going on, what it meant, and ultimately some clarity and confidence to make decisions to evolve their previously tried and tested approach.

That was the challenge, so we made it our mission to do that, a mission which still burns hard in everyone who works for us.

You guys haven’t seemed to stop this past year, with international growth at a phenomenal rate. What has the thinking been behind the growth you guys have seen? What’s driven the growth? Does having operations around the world mean you’re set up with holidays for life?

Since our launch in 2017 and as the business developed, it soon became apparent that a lack of data on the kids and parents’ ecosystem was not isolated just to the UK – but there was a need on a global basis that nobody was fulfilling. Therefore, we set our vision to be the global leaders, and made it our business to achieve that.

While we are now operating in 17 countries, our international team of researchers and developers are driving these developments from our Manchester HQ. The growth has been quicker than I could have ever imagined, which is down to so many factors from our initial investor, some lucky breaks, but most importantly it is down to the culture we have created, and the incredible efforts and collaboration from all our team.

Once we and other countries come out of Covid-19 restrictions, I cannot wait to see our team and get to travel more, no doubt with a few extra days rolled on for the odd holiday.

Speaking of developments, there latest major development from you guys is the Portal 4.0, a new platform for clients, destined to ‘change the way it all works for them’. This sounds exciting. Can you tell us about this one?

Firstly, everything which made Portal 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 so special remain. The ease of use, real-time data, and the ability to view, filter, interrogate, and analyse the data intuitively remain.

However, with all the feedback we have captured, we have not only made hundreds of small but significant improvements and enhancements, but we have also now integrated all the cutting-edge innovations which we have been working on in the background.

First and foremost, the portal holds all our propriety data, collected from surveying over half a million kids and parents across 17 countries every year. It provides over 600 million data points to view, filter, interrogate, and analyse.

In addition to that, it houses all the tools we have been developing, such as our Media Mix Compass – which is a media planning tool that enables clients to compare 11 different categories of media, based on their reach, preference, and time spent.

The platform also includes clustering tool Persona Perspectives™. Powered by cutting edge Machine Learning and utilising the latest theory from the world of psychology, clustering will unlock previously unseen insights into an audience and fanbase. This tool was developed with a team of academics at Manchester Metropolitan University.

We have also added contextual data for every country which we operate in, providing socioeconomic and demographic data and insights for additional context. There are new API feeds from the likes of Instagram, TikTok, Twitch, and YouTube.

A new section of the portal has also been created to house all our clients’ bespoke research projects – enabling them to utilize all the functionality of the portal as well as our persona technology.

So, in summary we have not only moved the goalposts, but we have completely rebuilt them. But don’t just take my word, I would encourage people to go and have a look and let us know your feedback.

How will this new platform position you guys in the UK and on the international stage? How will it work to help position clients on the international stage?

Despite 2020 being a challenging year, we managed to grow substantially and lay the foundations for this year – which we believe will see us essentially double in size every six to eight months.

Our new identity and portal will also provide the foundations for this. As I mentioned, there are so many significant new developments in the new portal – with our team of researchers, data scientists, and developers working with academics, and collaborating with our clients from around the world to bring in a suite of solutions.

This will see us transition from not “just” being a research company, but to a business-critical partner to clients who can use the tools such as our Media Mix Compass™ to actively shape their strategies.

One of the core approaches to our research which makes us standout from anyone else, is that we are independent, and the kids, parents, and families surveyed are age, gender, and nationally represented and not recruited through our own platforms. This means the data is not biased, has no agenda, and can be analysed on a global, regional, national, or local basis – something which I believe will be critical as we transition from globalisation to localisation.

Why is it important that clients are armed in this way with the ability to spot and react to opportunities in the ever evolving kids’ and family market?

It is my belief that research, and data is now a critical part of all our jobs. If you work in advertising, content, licensing, marketing, product development, or sales it is an essential tool to provide understanding, test our convictions and ultimately measure our results.

However, there are still large amounts of market research and data which are not accessible, and worse than that – quite intimidating. And whilst we can call default to doing a bit of desk research or talking to our own kids, if we are honest with our selves – that doesn’t really stack up. That is why we have set it to be our mission to become the world’s top brands business-critical partner. Portal 4.0 is so accessible that even my mum can use it!

Our unique approach to surveying kids, parents, and families on a continual basis enables us to identify trends as they are forming. Likewise, if we take the effects of Covid – it provides our clients with an unrivalled view of what their attitudes, behaviour, and consumption were before Covid-19, how they have evolved during the pandemic and lockdowns and ultimately what they will become after.

As far as I am aware, we are the only company in the world to have this information. We know from our industry report that only six per cent of organisations that operate in the kids, parents, and family space believe that they have a sufficient understanding of them.

Our Trend Alert™ Reports and real-time data also saw us spot the rising popularity of trends such as Fortnite and TikTok months before they exploded in popularity in the kid’s ecosystem.

However, one of the most important trends we have tracked is this generation of kids have more influence than ever before. For example, our data in the UK shows a 15 per cent increase in influence that tweens have from Q1 2020 to Q1 2021 in terms of grocery items purchases, as kids are increasingly concerned with our effect on the environment and becoming healthier.

It is therefore more important than ever to reach and engage these young stakeholders and every brand must now become a family brand.

What do you think are some of the biggest challenges to have swept the children’s and family space in recent years? What sort of picture of the future does this all paint, and how are you helping businesses ready themselves for that future landscape?

There are so many challenges. I look back to my days at Mattel – and cannot believe how much the landscape has transformed. If we are all honest, it has probably taken the best part of a decade for the industry to recognise this, and the scale of the change.

I would like to think that we have helped the industry and individuals to not only recognise the changes, but also understand the implications and be best positioned to transform their approach across their business.

As for the biggest challenge – my view would be the impact of digital, this impacts all aspects of an organisation and business. It has transformed everything, from advertising and media to the need to be a content curator and syndicator. Plus, the arrival of new digital centric IP.

It has been challenging, but it is also extremely exciting as there are significant opportunities that come from this – and that is why we do what we do, to mitigate the risks and accelerate the opportunities.

For you, what is the most exciting part of working in the children’s and family space? To what extent is this a market that leads change across the consumer landscape, and how does it shape future trends?

As Nelson Mandela once said “children are our greatest treasure. They are our future”. Being a proud father of my daughter, I am so proud that we as a business provide children, parents, and families with a voice to shape their worlds. And of course, with the speed of technology evolution it is incredible to witness the impact of this on their and their parents’ attitudes, behaviour, and consumption – and how brands need to evolve their thinking to remain relevant.

To get freemium access to our award-winning real-time portal, please visit:

https://try.theinsightsfamily.com/toynews

The Insights People rebrands as The Insights Family and launches Portal 4.0

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The kids’, parents, and family market intelligence outfit, The Insights People has officially rebranded as The Insights Family, with a renewed purpose of ‘being the voice of children. parents, and families,’ as well as a ‘business-critical partner for the world’s top brands.’

 The company, which provides real-time data on their attitudes, behaviour, and consumption patterns, surveys more than 362,100 kids and more than 176,800 parents across 17 countries each year.

Amid the latest development for the company, The Insights Family has also launched its latest version of the award-winning insights platform, Portal 4.0. The newest iteration includes 11 new features, enabling brands to view, filter, interrogate, and analyse all of its data.

The new tool also includes Persona Perspectives, which has been developed by the in-house team of data scientists and developers in collaboration with academics, utilising Machine Learning. It’s hoped that the tool will unlock previously unseen insights into a brand’s audience and fanbase.

Portal 4.0 also launches with Trend Tracker, Country Context Tool, new data dashboards, and the ability to track API data from third party sources such as YouTube and TikTok.

As well as this, the platform includes the On-Track reports written by the team of researchers at The Insights Family, plus the recently launched media planning Media Mix Compass that aims to give a 360-degree view of kids’ media consumption.

Nick Richardson, Founder & CEO, said: “It is my belief that research, and data is now a critical part of all of our jobs. If you work in advertising, content, licensing, marketing, product development, or sales it is an essential tool to provide understanding, test our convictions, and ultimately measure our results.

“However, there are still large amounts of market research and data which are not accessible, and worse than that – quite intimidating. And whilst we can call default to doing a bit of desk research or talking to our own kids, if we are honest with ourselves – that doesn’t really stack up. That is why we have set it to be our mission to become the world’s top brands business-critical partner.”

Simon White, the new chairman at The Insights Family, added: “As the world moves on from the challenges of living through a pandemic, the right insights will enable businesses to act faster, with greater certainty and a reduced cost. There has never been a better time to be in this sector, with The Insights Family.

“Further, leading the way in which insight is filtered, presented, and disseminated through organisations will prove to be a unique and long-term competitive advantage. What the team has created at The Insights Family is peerless, and where it can be taken over the medium and long-term is an exciting plan to be a part of.”

Flowhaven secures $16 million in latest investment round as it gears for global growth

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The industry’s first licensing relationship management platform, Flowhaven, has raised a $16 million Series A financing round, bringing the total amount raised by the company to $21.5 million to date.

The financing round was led by Sapphire Sport, with participation from existing investors Global Founders Capital and Icebreaker.vc.

The new financing will fuel the next phase in the company’s growth, including expanding its leading brand licensing platform, and building on its global sales and marketing operations across the US, Europe, and Asia.

Flowhaven automates every phase of the brand licensing workflow process, including planning and strategy, account and agreement management, content distribution, design approvals, royalty reporting and more.

The company’s platform enables any brand – large or small – to manage the entire lifecycle of a licensing partnership, and present communication gaps. Flowhaven offers a system of record that facilitates the instant flow of information between the many stakeholders typically involved in bringing a licensed product to market.

“Brands, whether it be a large corporation like Nintendo or a small mom-and-pop shop, are ubiquitous, and they all need a seamless way of managing their profile across every touchpoint,” said Kalle Törmä, CEO and co-founder, Flowhaven.

“Today, this process is largely managed by spreadsheets and a mish-mash of disparate solutions. As a result, licensing teams waste hours piecing together siloed information to ensure agreements are routed to the right team in a timely manner. We’ve raised this latest round of financing to double down on our product so we can facilitate licensing workflows for every major entertainment, media lifestyle brand and agency in need.”

The funding comes on the heels of significant momentum for Flowhaven, marked by 400 per cent year-over-year growth. Flowhaven already powers a number of Fortune 100 companies and some of the most prominent brands and agencies in the world including Nintendo, LAIKA, Acamar Films, Games Workshop and Crunchyroll.

“As a studio that manages numerous licensing partners and product submissions, Flowhaven has become indispensable in our effort to delight fans with branded products based on our timeless animated films,” said Dave Burke, chief marketing officer, LAIKA.

“The platform’s ability to track all our licensing agreements and licensed products, create custom workflows that meet our stringent brand approval requirements, and generate robust reporting via its configurable dashboard are empowering us to take LAIKA’s brand licensing program to the next level.”

Michael Spirito, partner, Sapphire Sport, added: “Flowhaven is not just transforming the brand licensing process, the team is unlocking untapped value for brand owners who are now, more than ever, trying to connect to their customers in a truly data-enabled manner.

“This is a product built by licensing professionals for licensing professionals and it’s Kalle and Timo’s vision and pedigree in this space that has enabled them to build a best-in-class solution of this caliber. 

“We are thrilled to have Flowhaven join the Sapphire Sport family and be able to play a role in furthering their growth and success.”

Penguin Random House owner Bertelsmann sets out to acquire Simon & Schuster for $2.2bn

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Bertelsmann, owner of publishers Penguin Random House, has set out to acquire Simon & Schuster from ViacomCBS for $2.2bn, in a move that would ‘strengthen the company’s global footprint,’ particularly in the US.

Simon & Schuster employs around 1,500 people worldwide and generated revenues of $814 million in 2019.

The acquisition is subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to close sometime next year. Bertelsmann has stated that it is ‘confident’ the acquisition would be approved.

The Bookseller reports that Simon & Schuster will continue to be managed as a separate publishing entity under the Penguin Random House umbrella.

Thomas Rabe, chairman and CEO of Bertelsmann said that the deal to acquire Simon & Schuster will enable the company to expand its global content business, strengthen its digital offering and build dominance in the US.

“Following the full acquisition of Penguin Random House in April this year, this purchase marks another strategic milestone in strengthening our global content businesses, which includes Penguin Random House, the Fremantle TV production business, and the BMG music division,” said Rabe.

“The book business has been part of Bertelsmann’s identity since the founding of C Bertelsmann Verlag more than 185 years ago and has lost none of its appeal to this day. Bertelsmann continues to be one of the world’s leading creative companies with annual investments in content of around €6bn.

“Bertelsmann will finance the acquisition of Simon & Schuster from existing cash resources. External borrowing is not necessary, thanks partly to the overall positive business development since the summer and the already completed sale of various businesses, investments and real-estate properties.”

Markus Dohle, CEO of Penguin Random House, added: “Simon & Schuster is an extremely well-managed and extraordinarily attractive company with world-renowned authors, 2,000 new publications annually, and a catalog of 35,000 titles. We are very proud to welcome this esteemed company, founded in 1924, to our global publishing community.

“We share the same passion for books and reading and will work together to give our authors the greatest possible access to readers worldwide. Penguin Random House empowers its 320 publishers around the world with maximum creative and entrepreneurial freedom and will, of course, extend this to our new colleagues at Simon & Schuster.”

Ian Chapman, UK and international publisher and CEO for Simon & Schuster, said: “The news today comes at the end of a long year for us all and we welcome it with open arms. To become part of the outstanding global company that is Penguin Random House is a truly significant moment for us all. I would like to take the opportunity to thank the staff in the UK, India and Australia for their fortitude and resilience during this uncertain time and our authors and their literary agents who have shown abiding loyalty and trust in us. We look forward to thriving even more vibrantly under new ownership.”