MUMBAI: Warner Bros. Entertainment has entered into a deal with Chinese firm You On Demand Media that will make its new releases and catalogue films available on China‘s first national pay-per-view and VoD platform, expected to be accessible to 3 million homes by the end of this summer.
The agreement makes Warner the first Hollywood studio to offer films on such a platform in China where foreign media conglomerates have not been granted broadcast TV licences.
"The opportunity of China is just too irresistible to most companies and particularly Warner Bros.," said Warner Bros international home video president Jim Wuthrich.
"We‘ve been trying to crack this nut for a while.The service will release films like the 2010 hit Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 and the recent Russell Brand comedy Arthur. Most of the 600 films that Warner Bros. has sold by way of DVDs in China would be offered through the service," he added.
In addition to films from the Warner Bros. library that include Batman and the Harry Potter series, the service would include recently released films that would appear on Chinese pay-per-view services about the same time they are released on DVD.
Last week, Legendary Pictures, a Burbank company that helped finance and produce films like The Hangover and The Dark Knight, entered into a joint venture with a Chinese entertainment conglomerate to make big-budget English-language films in China for export around the world.
