Asia: Ferris Wheel Ticketing, G-Dragon, All That Matters

Ticketing Startup Gets $15M

A number of Chinese business ventures have participated in a series B round worth $15 million in the Chinese online ticket sales platform Ferris Wheel Ticketing.

Online ticketing in China is very big in the movie field. About 75 percent of all cinema tickets in China are purchased online. The vast majority of performing arts tickets, however, are not, though tickets sales for both movies and performing arts overall were about the same in 2016 – 46 billion RMB ($6.8 billion).

Ferris Wheel Ticketing, which used to be called Niumowang Ticketing, was founded in 2015, and provides online services to buyers and sellers of tickets for concerts, operas, plays, musicals, dance performances and exhibitions, according to the China Money Network website.

At present, the platform facilitates approximately 60,000 ticket sales a month for a transaction value of $4 million. It also handles discount tickets and seat reservation services. In an earlier round that took place in October 2016 the company received “several million dollars.”

The proceeds from this latest round will be used to “build a team, develop new products and improve marketing,” according to CMN.

Ferris Wheel isn’t the only online ticket platform to attract interest from Chinese investors. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s cultural and entertainment group acquired a Beijing-based online ticketing service called Damai.cn three months ago, and last year three capital investment companies invested $10 million in the online event ticket sales startup Tking.cn.

K-Pop Persists

Since the beginning of the year, concerts and other activities by South Korean artists have been curtailed on the mainland because of Beijing’s opposition to a controversial missile defense system that the U.S. wants to install on South Korean soil. But in recent weeks, China’s government-backed resistance to K-pop has seen some erosion.

G-Dragon, the leader of the K-pop boy band Big Bang, recently released his latest solo album and the title song, “Untitled,” has topped all five major categories – new song, music video, K-pop music video, trending and real-time popularity – on China’s QQ Music streaming and download services.

In addition, according to KBS World Radio News, QQ reports that 760,000 copies of the Untitled album were sold on the first day it was released.

That represents sales of more than 1.2 billion won ($1 million). The album also topped iTunes charts in 39 countries worldwide, a new record for a South Korean singer.

Tencent VP At All That Matters

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The 2017 edition of All That Matters, an annual conference that covers issues and trends in five industries – music, sports, gaming, online and marketing – will be at the Ritz Carlton Millenia Singapore Sept. 9-13.

The gaming component, according to The New Paper, will be a new feature this year. The main speaker at the conference is Chase Carey, the chairman and chief executive officer of Formula 1.

Other speakers include executives from Netflix, Fox Networks Group Asia, Coca-Cola, Japan 2019 Rugby World Cup and the Asian Tour. There will also be a half-day China Music Forum, which focuses on the Chinese music industry and will include presentations, interviews and panel discussions, as well as a keynote address by Andy Ng, the group vice president of Tencent Music Entertainment.

Jasper Donat, the CEO of Branded Limited, the company that puts together the conference, said in a news release, “This year is going to be our biggest and best yet. Our business days will be packed with the largest gathering of music, sports, online, marketing and now gaming industries in Asia.”