Company creates lunar New Year emoticon greetings

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WeChat and Weibo－China's equivalent to What'sApp, Facebook and Twitter－are the major tools of online communication in the country, and emoticons thrive because they add fun and spice to conversations－and let's admit it, they're pretty cute. As Chinese New Year draws near, let’s see what they have in store for China's biggest holiday.

You might not know the company's name, but you might have already used some of its emoticons. This cartoon image, a doll with a patch of grass on its head, is a popular WeChat emoticon produced by 12 Block Culture. As in previous years, these emoticons will be "dressed up" for the upcoming lunar New Year.

Icons of WeChat and Weibo apps in Beijing. /Reuters Photo

Paper greeting cards have almost been part of history. Now people send New Year greetings with short videos or WeChat emoticons. 12 Block Culture is one company that produces some of these emoticons. Here's a sneak peak at some of their new products rolled out for Spring Festival.

The most popular emoticons created by the company come in different lunar New Year sets. Tuanzi, the doll with grass on its head, Freeze Girl, Little Zombie, and Groundhog are the star products of the company.

Apart from the emoticon sets made exclusively for the lunar New Year, these popular images have made into short videos for Spring Festival. They can be sent via various online media platforms such as WeChat, QQ, Weibo, and other portals.

Tuanzi. /CGTN Photo

Wang Biao, CEO of 12 Block Culture, established the company two years ago. He recruited some up and coming cartoonists that he found on Weibo, assigned them into teams, and had them develop their cartoon images into WeChat emoticons. These cartoonists signed as artists of the company, which hopes to become an incubator for emoticon images.

Wang said: “Our WeChat emoticons have been sent tens of billions of times. In total, they have been downloaded over a billion times. ”

He added that this emoticon of Freeze Girl kneeling down and saying, "thanks boss" for “hong bao", or a "red envelope (containing money)" has been extremely popular during the Chinese New Year holiday season. This single emoticon has been sent out a billion times.

The image of "Tuanzi" has had two sets made exclusively for the Chinese New Year.

Icon of Wechat. /CGTN Pho

Wang explained China doesn't have a big Image IP (Intellectual Property) company yet, but his goal is to create one.

Apart from making various products based on its cartoons, the company has licensed its images to many other brands, such as e-commerce giant Jingdong.com, jewelry brand Chow Tai Fook, and Bright Dairy. "Tuanzi" was also the first Chinese image invited to be exhibited in Japan's Tokyo Tower.

Wang's company received a large amount of venture capital investment with online and offline cooperation also in the works. It seems that his dream of creating China's first major Image IP Company is not far away.