Kids round-up: CMC goes online next week; Wildbrain Spark to manage ‘Shimajiro’ brand

CMC launches online next week

The 2020 Children’s Media Conference (CMC) gets underway next week, with a panel devoted to the impact of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) campaign on the children’s and youth audience, among the session highlights.

The CMC is among the many events that have moved online due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but still has a full schedule for guests to attend from Monday, 6 July to Friday, 10 July.

Among them will be a keynote panel about the BLM movement, with speakers including Professor Kevin Clark, founding director of the Center for Digital Media Innovation and Diversity at George Mason University in the US, author Cressida Cowell and social activist Larissa Kennedy.

CMC editorial director Greg Childs said: “Our industry, and our world, is going through a period of intense disruption and reckoning – and it is more important than ever to gather together (virtually) to discuss how we respond to and grow from this as a community.”

Other highlights of the conference programme include: the annual opening Question Time session, featuring screenwriter and showrunner Russell T Davies, Baroness Beeban Kidron and Tracy Brabin MP, and Adina Pitt, VP of content acquisitions and co-productions for Cartoon Network and Boomerang joining judges in pitching competition ‘Put Your Money Where your Mouth Is’.

Shimajiro

Wildbrain Spark to manage ‘Shimajiro’ brand

WildBrain Spark, the digital media division of kids’ entertainment company WildBrain, has been appointed by Japan’s Benesse Corporation to manage the English-language channel and content for its hit pre-school brand Shimajiro on YouTube.

Shimajiro is an educational character and learning buddy, popular in Asia, and WildBrain Spark will look to grow the presence of the brand’s English-language content with a focus on the UK, US and the wider English global market.

Rachel Taylor, commercial director at WildBrain Spark, said: “As we continue growing our connections with brand owners all around the world, we’re very much looking forward to working closely with the Japan-based Benesse Corporation to grow their Shimajiro brand in key international markets.”