My Journey by Les' Copaque at Kre8tif! Conference 2018

After a lot of years being aware of the existence ofLes' Copaque,
I noticed that there is an apostrophe after the Les word.  

The talk, a 20 minutes long was given by Les' Copaque owner and Managing Director, Hj Burhanuddin Md Radzi - the name was pronounced as Em Dee Radzi. MD as the letter M and D. The announcer didn't do much homework.

Les' Copaque the Name

Les' Copaque is a French-ly name with no meaning in French nor it is related to French. Last Kopek is the lingo or the slang used when you are playing cards and you have your last card with you. Last

Kopek to those who grew up in Keramat, was a yearly sales held at the football field in Bukit Keramat. Organised by PULAPOL if I'm not mistaken. Last kopek means it's final, that's it, last of last, done!

The last I heard Tuan Haji's talk, it was lengthy and he was speaking
in Bahasa Melayu and there were no strict time limits.
That was a lot better than this Kre8tif! talk. But stories of success,
is always inspiring. You can never get enough of it.

Background

He is from the oil & gas industry, jumped into the animation scene after 2 years of doing research on the market. He and Hajjah was considering film making before deciding that film doesn't make money. So Les' Copaque started in 2005. Their initial project was to produce a movie titled Geng. Along the way they picked up Upin & Ipin, pushed it onto TV9 to test the waters. It became an instance hit and Geng: Pengambaraan Bermula was rewritten because of this.

Numbers Today

Today, the company has 200 creative people, more than 50 awards, 3 titles and 12 seasons of Upin & Ipin. They produce 42 episodes x 7 minutes per year. Apart from the giant Upin & Ipin, they have Pada Zaman Dahulu and Puteri. Puteri is well received but being put on hold for a moment until they figure out why they put it on hold. Well, he didn't have a reason, so I figured that was the reason. Les' Copaque is a company managed and run by Tuan Hj Burhanuddin, Hajjah and also her daughter.

They, it seems, have a team of professional gamers.

Upin & Ipin 

So these two boys are very successful. They are all around South East Asia. Their Facebook fans and You Tube subscribers are by the millions. Sixty percent of them comes from Indonesia, says Haji. I suppose it's true. They have the numbers. But should it be broken down to percentage of population against the likes and subs, it would be different. Anyway, if the Indonesian loves Upin & Ipin more, we should be proud.

Mickey and.. I mean Upin & Ipin's number.

I have Indonesia and China, if all works fine, I will have India.
I then have more than half of Asia! says Hj in a previous talk I attended.

The process (Pipeline) will control the production.

Upin & Ipin and Indonesia

The Indonesian loves Upin & Ipin more than Malaysian do. I heard it from Haji himself and also from one of his animation directors. The director I met some 2 years ago told me a story of how some Indonesian fans actually flew in and came up to their office just to visit thee place of Upin & Ipin. A few will be nice but come a hundred, they are in big trouble. It might just be a good idea for Les' Copaque to have Upin & Ipin theme park in Jakarta or any parts of Indonesia.

The original voice actor of Upin & Ipin, Asyiela Putri is a celebrity there in Indonesia. She has been invited to Indonesia numerous times. She goes in for talk shows on TVs and radio stations. Fans do call her up on radio stations to have a chance to talk to her. Meanwhile, not really a big hit amongst local fans. Haji Burhanuddin is all supportive for Asyiela. And merchandising sells big time. I personally found more attractive (and better quality?) merchandise sold in Bandung compare to in KL. Well, maybe I did not shop in KL. Susanti, the character in Upin & Ipin is from Jakarta. Might be a way Les' Copaque telling their Indonesian fans they love them too.

IP Creation

IP (Intellectual Property) creating is a serious business! says The Man. He outlined 3 types of Animation Business Model. Advertising & Outsourcing and IP Creator. The first two are servicing jobs. IP Creation is very risky. You can put in all your knowledge and spend months to come up with a character, then more months to come up with a test episode and after all these, you might just fail. Your character could just not work. Today, you guys are lucky to have You Tube, says Haji. You get to test market online. Numbers are there and with that you can approach tv stations. Those days, if your episodes are being picked up by pirates and sold at Pasar Malam, you know you've made it.

Upin & Ipin has peneterate China and working closely with Disney India. Registering their IP in China cost them around 1 million. I believe he said Ringgit.

Upin & Ipin is being fully monetized from merchandise, food, theme parks and character licensing. (Les' Copaque could be in deep trouble with the Child Labour Act.) They are considering their own in-door park. Their yearly exhibition in PICC, Putrajaya would attract thousands. I just can't get into Putrajaya, says a Putrajaya residence friend once, all excess were blocked. In 2015, Upin & Ipin was at MAHA event and that yearly event attracted the most visitors in their history.

Latest Project

The audience would not be satisfied without this - latest project. So, Upin & Ipin is coming up with their new movie. It is behind schedule and is costing a lot. I had the privileged to watch the low res  (playblast) trailer a few years back and it was impressive. Hopefully this would rake in a lot of Ringgit. The cost is now standing at RM 29 million.

Upin & Ipin is a success story. They have been going strong for more than 10 years now. Popularity might dip down along the way. But 20 years from now, when those 6 years olds in 2005 are 36 with children, Upin & Ipin will come back stronger.