FuturumKids brings growing portfolio to MIPTV

With activity ramping up across its first two properties and a new project under discussion, state-of-the art animation and media company FuturumKids has a busy MIPTV planned* for its visit to the Palais des Festivals in Cannes.

The FuturumKids team will promote the company’s ongoing plans, including work on its newest pre-school property Ling Ling. Monster Entertainment, Futurum’s distributor, will focus on developing additional territories for FuturumKid’s fast-growing children’s hit Paddles.

A strong FuturumKids team, which includes Global Head of Sales Brendan Kelly and CEO Francis Fitzpatrick, will be attending the show to discuss pre-sales and L&M partnerships for the company’s newest pre-school series Ling Ling with potential broadcast and licensing partners.

Ling Ling is the story of a wide-eyed panda newly arrived from Shanghai at Tavistock’s International School for Animals, London’s premier – and most eccentric – pre-school educational establishment. Ling Ling launched at the 2021 Cartoon Forum to a very positive response and is now in pre-production at Futurum’s studios in Las Palmas.

Meanwhile the very first Futurum preschool series, Paddles, goes from strength to strength. Paddles has already been sold to Cartoonito UK and has aired on Ireland’s RTE. It’s also on its way to the Stan streaming service in Australia thanks to a deal brokered by Monster Entertainment. Monster Entertainment was appointed in early 2021 to handle global television sales for Paddles in all territories except Korea. More major broadcast deals are imminent.

But that’s not all. FuturumKids will also be highlighting plans for new projects, including a major UK children’s book property that the company has acquired with the aim of beginning work on another pre-school series later this year.

And of course with the rollout of Paddles merchandise at an advanced stage, the ongoing Paddles licensing and merchandising campaign will be a major theme of the FuturumKids presence. In fact the FuturumKids team are also exhibiting a new line of Paddles-inspired highly collectible NFTs (non-fungible tokens). These will be on sale on Openseas and other NFT platforms immediately after MIPTV.

Paddles, a charming, exciting and very funny 52 x 11 series, tells the story of a polar bear cub accidentally delivered by the Stork to a frozen River Shannon in Ireland – and brought up by a pack of Irish wolfhounds. Through the adventures, mistakes and discoveries of its funny and huggable star, and his friends Bracken, Bridie and Fagan, the series shows its young audience that being different is something to be celebrated and enjoyed.

Paddles’ makers include members of the team behind the seven-time Emmy-award-winning children’s series Jakers! FuturumKids also contains senior figures from HIT Entertainment and its global franchises Bob the Builder, Barney and Thomas and Friends.

Brendan Kelly, Head of Sales at FuturumKids, says: “Pre-school entertainment is a more popular and competitive area of kids’ broadcasting and streaming than ever and FuturumKids has attracted strong interest with Paddles and Ling Ling, two shows with enormous pre-school appeal. Not surprisingly, FuturumKids and Monster Entertainment are looking forward immensely to MIPTV 2022, at which we intend to talk in depth about our plans for these shows – and much, much more!”