Using the 'fan economy' to build franchises

Text is being turned into gold in China's entertainment world

iQiyi, the web-based entertainment arm of Chinese tech giant Baidu, will start to broadcast in October, a series based on the popular crime novel Mei Ren Wei Xian that loosely translates to "beauty lies within the dumpling", in a first major exploration of its franchise-building abilities, a senior company executive says.

Written for the web by an in-house team, the 36-episode thriller would also be adapted for the big screen and as a cellphone game in the future, Dai Ying, general manager, online drama production, iQiyi, says.