The Tamesis
” The Ugly Immortals,” a dark dream, came to be the initial Chinese internet book to get in Universal Studios Singapore park.
Yuewen
Hollywood enjoyment titans put numerous bucks annually right into the search for the following Harry Potter. Studios commonly count on a tiny circle of manufacturers, doubters and execs making judgment phone calls– a procedure as high-risk as it is costly. A current plant of Hollywood flops this year consists of “Christy,” starring Sydney Sweeney as a fighter, and “Die My Love,” with Jennifer Lawrence as a mommy fighting mental disorder.
A various, much more tech-savvy method to the look for champions is arising from China. So thinks Tencent-backed China Literary works Ltd., the nation’s biggest on the internet literary works system and a leading international web content firm that has actually developed success with a large area of viewers and authors to lead its web content growth. “We stabilize the art of narration and the scientific research of crowdsourced understanding to find what reverberates,” chief executive officer Hou Xiaonan informed Forbes China in a current meeting.
By accepting what he calls “a version of mass co-creation,” China Literary works, likewise called Yuewen, has actually grown among the globe’s biggest electronic fiction collections with a neighborhood of 500,000 abroad authors and collaborations with Netflix and Disney+. With that assistance, the firm intends to develop a “international IP world– an enthusiastic vision to reword the future of international enjoyment,” Hou claimed. Currently, its copyright, or IPs, make up almost fifty percent of China’s most effective dramatization and computer animations, he included.
Hou explains Yuewen as “the YouTube of stories” or “an MCN (multichannel network) for writers.” His examples catch what he refers to as the system’s significance: a dynamic environment where numerous numerous authors and viewers jointly form tales, serving as a worldwide content board and real-time emphasis team.
Yuewen’s background days to 2015. Tencent, among China’s most effective social networks firms, has almost 57% of business, which has actually been openly traded at the Hong Kong Stock Market considering that 2017. Hou initially signed up with Tencent in 2003, and held monitoring placements there for Mobile QQ, Qzone, Tencent Open System, YingYongBao and Penguin Media Web Content System prior to he signed up with Yuewen as head of state in 2020 and chief executive officer in 2023. Hou still holds effective placements in Tencent consisting of vice head of state of the System and Web Content Team.
Younger Yuewen’s environment is improved 4 columns, according to Hou:
* An open system gives a large possibility for tale production. Yuewen’s front runner sites– Qidian Reviewing and WebNovel– permit any individual to release tales straight, bypassing conventional posting gatekeepers, Hou claimed. Yuewen currently takes care of over 10 million initial stories, making it China’s biggest internet literary works system; in 2024 alone, 330,000 brand-new authors generated 650,000 brand-new jobs, he kept in mind.
Yuewen’s WebNovel website invites authors around the globe.
Yuewen
* Straight viewers involvement develops real-time recognition. Yuewen viewers pay per phase and offer immediate comments with repayments and evaluations. “This straight discussion in between makers and their target market gives unrivaled market understanding, confirming a tale’s prospective lengthy prior to adjustment,” Hou kept in mind.
* Shared earnings constructs a lasting “designer economic situation.” By connecting writer revenues straight to viewers repayments, Yuewen changes composing from a pastime right into an occupation, and has actually developed among the globe’s biggest expert writer neighborhoods, Hou claimed.
* Information notifies decision-making. Yuewen’s content groups work as “critical overviews, mixing innovative instinct with deep area understandings,” Hou claimed. “They look past basic clicks to metrics that indicate longer term capacity, like viewers commitment, psychological financial investment, and category versatility,” he claimed. The outcome is what Hou calls an “IP channel” that filters 10s of numerous jobs to those most feasible for high-cost adjustment right into movies, collection, video games, or computer animation.
This “bottom-up” method has actually caused Yuewen-originated hits such as Heart Land ( Douluo Dalu) and Fight With the Paradises (Doupo Cangqiong) and developed faithful fanbases long prior to their display adjustments, drastically decreasing manufacturing threat, Hou claimed.
In 2024, 16 of China’s 30 most prominent television dramatization originated from Yuewen IPs, the firm states. According to Enlightent, a Chinese media analytics company, 6 of the 10 most-watched long-form dramatization throughout all on the internet systems in the initial fifty percent of 2025 were adjusted from Yuewen IPs. In computer animation, Yuewen IPs represented 80% of China’s leading 10 most-watched titles in the initial fifty percent of 2025, Enlightent states.
” The power of this version,” Hou claimed, “is that it constructs an encouraging system for creative thinking. It does not remove the natural changability of art, however it gives a framework that assists us recognize and support one of the most powerful tales, straight from our area.”
” In the electronic age, lasting success in web content might originate from scalable communities that continually create, verify and develop originalities,” states Yuewen chief executive officer Hou Xiaonan.
Yuewen
Yuewen’s vision does not quit at material exploration; the firm has actually developed an IP worth chain that settles in incubation, and expands with boosting and commercialization, Hou claimed. “Our environment functions like a ranch, a laboratory, and a play area. The ranch supports tale seeds, the laboratory after that changes them right into effective aesthetic experiences, and the play ground incorporates them right into individuals’s lives. This system is developed to take full advantage of the capacity of every tale.”
Yuewen’s “ranch” is improved its introducing paid analysis version, initially presented by its Qidian system. Visitors pay per phase, and earnings is shown authors. “This addresses the largest discomfort factor for makers: earnings security,” Hou claimed.
This system has actually grown an imaginative labor force of over 10 million authors, consisting of 468 “platinum writers” such as Flavor Jia San Shao, Mao Ni, and I Consume Tomatoes (Will Certainly Chi Xi Hong Shi)– house names in Chinese prominent fiction; front runner IPs like Delight of Life, Candle Light in the Burial Place, Heart Land, The King’s Character, and Fight With the Paradises all stemmed at Yuewen, confirmed by numerous paying viewers long prior to ending up being nationwide hits, Hou claimed
Yuewen’s “research laboratory” is its web content adjustment and optimization engine. By incorporating New Standards Media– among China’s leading movie and dramatization collection workshops, Tencent Computer animation & & Comic books– China’s biggest comic system, and its fast-growing brief dramatization department, Yuewen has actually developed among the market’s most effective IP adjustment pipes, Hou claimed. This incorporated matrix that makes use of the staminas of moms and dad firm Tencent is the engine behind Yuewen’s hits in conventional movie, dramatization collection and computer animation, and has actually aided to expand its authority in arising markets like live-action brief dramatization and comic-style brief dramatization (” manju”).
Unlike in lots of various other nations, live-action brief dramatization is an industry in China. Since mid-2025, greater than 576 million Chinese individuals– around half the nation’s net populace– were viewing live-action brief dramatization, Yuewen states. Yuewen’s adjustments held 2 of the leading 10 ports on nationwide leaderboards, with private collection exceeding 3 billion sights and gross earnings surpassing 80 million yuan throughout the duration. In the arising “comic-style brief dramatization” layout– a crossbreed in between manga and movement– a number of Yuewen titles have actually currently gone beyond 100 million sights on Douyin, the TikTok of China, Hou kept in mind.
” The utmost objective of IP is to enter into individuals’s lives,” he claimed. “At its core, IP has to do with psychological worth– it needs to welcome followers to have fun with it, deal with it.”
In a year when China’s “Labubu dolls” have actually ignited worldwide, Yuewen’s main goods brand name, “Yuewen Item,” have actually prolonged leading IPs right into a variety of antiques, blind boxes, porcelain figurines, and co-branded durable goods. In the initial fifty percent of 2025, its goods created 480 million yuan in gross goods worth, almost matching the overall for every one of 2024.
With each other, Yuewen’s “farm-lab-playground” version creates a self-reinforcing business loophole: the ranch grows and filterings system IPs with Qidian and WebNovel; the research laboratory changes them with movies, long-form dramatization collection, computer animation, and brief dramatization; and the play ground generates income from psychological involvement with items and experiences–” developing a flywheel where creative thinking, fandom, and business take a breath life right into each other,” Hou claimed.
Yuewen’s aspirations expand past China. Hou’s objective is to “develop an additional Yuewen overseas. Globalization isn’t merely regarding exporting Chinese tales. It’s had to do with co-building a common innovative environment” with a three-part strategy worldwide, he claimed.
Yuewen’s international trip initially started by converting effective Chinese titles for worldwide viewers, Hou claimed. With its international system WebNovel, the firm has actually launched greater than 10,000 equated Chinese jobs, getting to viewers in markets such as the united state, India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Australia, Malaysia, the U.K., Brazil, Canada, and France, according to Yuewen.
Yuewen at the exact same time has actually partnered with Disney, Netflix, Sony Photo, Webtoon, Piccoma, and various other worldwide authors to broaden its IPs right into comics, computer animation, and display adjustments. By mid-2025, 1,800 comics, 80 computer animations and greater than 100 movie and television titles from Yuewen had actually gotten in abroad markets, the firm claimed. Current hits like Delight of Life 2, The Tale of Shen Li, The Story of Rose, and The Dual have actually discovered success on streaming graphes throughout Asia; the computer animated adjustment of Lord of Mysteries premiered in over 190 nations and areas this previous summer season.
The dramatization “Delight of Life 2” discovered success in Asia.
Yuewen
Hou claimed the following action in Yuewen’s globalization method is much more enthusiastic– to breed regional makers. With WebNovel, Yuewen has actually developed a global writer area of around 500,000 authors, creating 770,000 initial operate in English and various other languages. Amongst them is JKSManga, a British designer whose collection My Vampire System has actually built up greater than 92 million keeps reading WebNovel, generated an audiobook with 1.1 billion streams, and currently has its very own comic adjustment, Hou kept in mind. “This notes a brand-new phase. We have actually gone from exporting Chinese tales to growing international ones,” he claimed.
Yuewen’s newest international endeavors relocate past web content to social assimilation. The firm has actually involved a varied lineup of companions– consisting of the Swiss National Tourist Board, the British Collection, the Singapore Tourist Board and Japan’s CCC Team– to check out brand-new kinds of international IP cooperation, Hou claimed.
In the U.K., 26 Chinese internet stories from Yuewen’s brochure have actually been contributed to the British Collection’s collection, while in Switzerland, Yuewen transformed The King’s Character lead character Ye Xiu right into an online “Swiss Traveling Traveler,” advertising personalized trips motivated by the collection. At the same time, the dark dream The Unruly Immortals (Dao Gui Yi Xian) came to be the initial Chinese internet book to get in Universal Studios Singapore amusement park, introducing a hit Halloween tourist attraction, Hou claimed.
Hou explains this development as “a clear three-step trip: from converting Chinese tales, to exporting the production version, to co-building a worldwide innovative environment.” In his sight, Yuewen’s duty is changing “from being China’s Yuewen to ending up being the globe’s Yuewen– a co-builder of the international innovative economic situation that links makers and customers throughout societies.”
Yuewen personifies just how huge adjustments are unraveling in just how tales are informed and shared. “Gone are the days of wagering every little thing on a solitary wizard. In the electronic age, lasting success in web content might originate from scalable communities that continually create, verify and develop originalities,” claimed Hou, defining the procedure as “methodical creative thinking”– a structure that “blends area interest with critical understanding. The objective is not to mechanize art, however to develop a lasting path for it to grow. “
” We do not change creative thinking with information,” he claimed. “We utilize information to equip creative thinking and locate the tales that really relocate individuals.”
As Yuewen’s tales take a trip from Chinese displays to international target markets, the firm is promoting its brand-new version for international IP growth. “The magic hinge on its design, where creative thinking is grown on the ranch, improved and scaled busy, and gave birth to in the area play ground,” Hou claimed, summarizing his version.
At the same time, Yuewen is transcending its duty as a writer to end up being a designer of society, Hou claimed. That consequently, he proceeded, likewise positions a crucial concern: “Suppose the most effective tales are not found by a fortunate couple of, however expanded by an encouraged cumulative?”
