Chinese language - One stop shop

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One stop shop
By JIANG JINGJING (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-09-24 07:20

At East Beijing's Central Business District (CBD), a brand-new
140,000-square-meter building will soon house China's largest copyright
trade center.

The Beijing International Copyright Trade Center will provide one-stop
services for listing copyright information, conducting copyright
business, investment and trade.

A professional copyright trade website, www.cnictc.com, has also been
established, enabling an easy and fast e-business model.

Project initiators call it a brave and constructive trial in the
industry. It is collaboration between Beijing's Chaoyang District
government and Beijing Hengyan Investment Co Ltd.

China does not have a large-scale, nationwide copyright trade center and
most deals are carried out through book, audio and video, as well as
animation fairs, says Liu Jun, the center's executive director.

Copyright business is just like a dumbbell, and the two heavy ends are
content and trade. Experts suggest China is not short of content, but
lacks a sufficient trade facility and environment, Liu notes.

"The new center provides a year-round platform for copyright owners,
buyers, investors and professional agencies."

The center is expected to bring in tens of millions of yuan in annual
trade volume within two years, and the scale will hit 100 million yuan
within three years, according to Liu.

The first phase of the project, located in Beijing's Jingguang Center,
was launched earlier this month with a business area of 5,000 square
meters, and will be expanded to 140,000 square meters when it moves to a
new building near Tonghui River.

By then, major players in the industry can relocate to the center,
enjoying convenient services and preferential policies, such as discounts
on office rent and better access to resources.

Xu Yizun, deputy-director of EB Game Environmental Science, says China
has gone through the initial phase of industrialization. In the next
level of development, original thinkers will be the biggest winners.

Historical problems

Xu is an initiator of the copyright trade center program. His company is
a local governmental consulting agency.

He says due to historical reasons, China's copyright trade has faced many
obstacles. People have not traditionally regarded copyrighting as a
business. That's why Karaoke operators found it hard to accept when asked
to pay copyright fees.

Weak demand for originality is the major reason for insufficient trade.
The country had simply copied what happened in Western countries.
Learning was the fastest way to catch up with developed countries,
therefore originality was not the focus in any industry.

Xu suggests problems still exist in terms of legal protection. Although
the country has enough copyright and IPR (intellectual property rights)
laws and regulations, the enforcement organization and methods are not
clear. For example, the National Copyright Administration is a government
watchdog, instead of a law enforcement organization. So the
administration has no right to sue copyright infringers, he says.

Copyright promotion

Lack of copyright promotional agencies is another reason. Xu points out
that all existing institutions are mainly supported by the government,
and have little knowledge of market demand and standard practices.

In the meantime, trade culture is still new to the country, and such a
concept needs to be popularized.

China is still seeking the best method or technology for the copyright
trade. Take the audio/video publishing industry, for example. The
production chain is so long - ranging from creating and recording to
wholesaling and retailing - that any missing detail could result in
copyright infringement.

But China Mobile has had a very successful mobile ring tone downloading
business. Based on Web 2.0 technology, a pop star can make more money
with a ring tone that China Mobile sells for 2 or 3 yuan than a top 40
single, because the CD might be copied.

Industry experts say the revenue of the mobile ring tone download
business has long exceeded the CD and cassette sector.

Liu says the center provides a gathering place for all links in the
sector, including providing legal protection to all players. The center
has teamed up with the Intellectual Property Committee of the All China
Lawyers Association.

Li Decheng, executive chairman of the Intellectual Property Committee of
All China Lawyers Association, says the legal team has been working on
terms and methods to not only stimulate the trade, but also secure legal
protection.

In terms of the center's content resources, five databases have been
established, including text, pictures, music, video and software. The
center has so far attracted over 100 copyrights of books and 100
copyrights of cartoons, films and TV series.

It also seeks international collaboration, such as signing a strategic
deal with US-based Metro Music Productions Inc.

Its global partners include the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, South
Korea and Ukraine.

With such resources, the center will be devoted to copyrighting domestic
trade, and imports and exports. In 2005, China's first copyright trade
center was launched in Changsha, capital of Central China's Hunan
Province. Later in the year, Shanghai opened a similar center.

But Liu points out that Beijing, with its advantage in cultural content
resources, is aiming to become a leader in China's cultural creative
industry by 2010.

(China Daily 09/24/2007 page9)

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