About China International Animation Copyright Fair

China International Animation Copyright Fair

The China International Animation Copyright Fair is China's only national-level professional fair for film and television animation copyright protection and trade. Held in Dongguan, Guangdong — China's largest toy-exporting city and self-styled "Capital of Art Toys" — the fair connects animation studios, IP owners, broadcasters, platforms, manufacturers and licensors in a single marketplace whose core business is the buying, selling and licensing of animation intellectual property. It is approved as a national animation professional fair and is a key project of Guangdong Province's "cultural province" construction. Since settling in Dongguan in December 2009, it has grown into one of the most influential professional platforms for copyright trading in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, deliberately fusing the creative IP economy with Dongguan's immense toy and derivative-products manufacturing base.

Settlement in Dongguan in 2009

The fair settled in Dongguan in December 2009 and was held for ten consecutive editions by 2019. The choice of host city was strategic: Dongguan is China's largest toy-exporting city, and its factories produce derivative merchandise for the world's entertainment industries — the Beijing Winter Olympics mascot Bing Dwen Dwen and the FIFA World Cup 2022 mascot La'eeb were both produced there. By holding the national animation copyright fair in the country's toy-manufacturing capital, the organisers placed IP trading directly beside the factories that turn licensed characters into products. The fair states its guiding approach as "internationalisation, specialisation and industrialisation," and it has been credited with integrating animation industry resources at home and abroad, building an industry docking platform and promoting the transformation and upgrading of traditional manufacturing in Guangdong, especially Dongguan, alongside the growth of emerging cultural industries.

Growth and cumulative record

Across its first decade, per organiser figures, the fair accumulated 3,781 exhibitors, 2.1 million visitors and a transaction amount of over RMB 20 billion, on an exhibition area recorded at 16,925 square metres for its editions of that period. The 10th edition alone gathered more than 100 domestic and foreign industry figures, 119 exhibitors, more than 2,000 professional purchasers and 70,000 animation enthusiasts. By its 13th edition, the fair had drawn over 4,500 domestic and foreign animation enterprises across 12 sessions, with turnover exceeding RMB 25 billion — figures that make it, by participation and transaction volume, China's principal animation-rights marketplace.

The 13th to 15th editions

The 13th edition ran July 20–23, 2023 at the Guangdong Modern International Exhibition Centre in Houjie Town, Dongguan. It covered 20,800 square metres with more than 500 exhibitors from over 40 countries and regions — including the United States, France, Germany and Canada — participating online and offline, displaying more than 1,500 animation and art-toy IPs and over 10,000 derivative products. Four high-end forums accompanied the show, with speakers including American film director and animator Daniel St. Pierre and Cai Zhijun, executive vice president of the China Animation Association. The 14th edition in 2024 showcased IP animations and games from some 60 countries and regions, with displays of virtual characters, holographic booths and glasses-free 3D experiences. The 15th edition, in August 2025, gathered over 600 companies and more than 2,000 IPs, continuing the fair's expansion of both its exhibitor base and its catalogue of licensable properties.

The 16th edition and the Shipai move

The 16th edition, held August 6–10, 2026, marked a step change. It moved to the China Toy Capital Animation Expo Center in Shipai Town, Dongguan — a 130,000-square-metre centre integrating exhibition, production and sales facilities — and extended from four days to five under the theme "Integration Without Boundaries." The fair covered 33,100 square metres, 25 percent more than the previous edition, with more than 500 companies and organisations presenting over 2,200 high-quality IP properties from China and abroad across five exhibition areas covering film and animation IP, digital innovation, cross-industry IP applications and Dongguan designer-toy brands, plus a designer-toy supermarket. It signed RMB 2.065 billion in projects, and its "professional exhibition plus industrial town" model ties the event to Dongguan's planned 112.2-square-kilometre designer-toy and cultural tourism zone, with a "5+365" operating model combining the five-day fair with year-round services for product development, manufacturing, IP licensing, market access and international trade.

International programme and the ASIFA partnership

The 16th edition significantly expanded the fair's international participation. For the first time it formed a strategic partnership with the International Animated Film Association (ASIFA), after promoting the event at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival in France — the world's leading animation festival. More than 40 award-winning animated films from leading international festivals, including Annecy and Cannes, were screened during the fair, and more than 100 industry figures attended, including former ASIFA president Abi Feijó and European stop-motion filmmaker Ülo Pikkov. Participating organisations included CCTV Animation, China Animation Group, Haichang Ocean Park, Alibaba's 1688 platform and Xiaohongshu. A citywide August programme spread activity across three venues — the Shipai fair centre, an animation and designer-toy exhibition at the Dongguan Exhibition Center, and a carnival at the Minying International Trade Center — with immersive events including mecha parades, a robot band performing with an animation symphony, esports competitions and autograph sessions.

What the fair trades

Unlike consumer comic conventions, the fair's core is rights business. Exhibitors present animation IPs — characters, series and films — and the derivatives, licensing and co-production opportunities attached to them; professional buyers and purchasers negotiate copyright protection and trade, licensing for toys and merchandise, and cross-industry applications of IP in areas from cultural tourism to digital products. The art-toy (designer toy) sector has become a second pillar: Dongguan's factories increasingly produce collectible designer toys, and the fair's later editions give Dongguan's own designer-toy brands a dedicated showcase alongside global IP. The combination of a national copyright-trading mandate with the world's toy-manufacturing base in one city is unique to this event.

Role in Dongguan's industrial strategy

For Dongguan, the fair is an instrument of industrial upgrading. A city built on export manufacturing uses the event to move its factories from contract production toward IP ownership, licensing income and original brands — the "transformation and upgrading of traditional industries" the organisers cite. The designer-toy and cultural tourism zone, the permanent expo centre in Shipai and the year-round "5+365" services all extend the fair from a four- or five-day event into standing infrastructure for that strategy. Guangdong's designation of the fair as a key "cultural province" project aligns provincial cultural policy with the same goal.

Significance

As China's only national-level professional fair for animation copyright protection and trade, the China International Animation Copyright Fair holds a monopoly position in its niche — and its record justifies it: more than 4,500 enterprises hosted across its first 12 sessions, turnover above RMB 25 billion, editions growing from under 21,000 to over 33,000 square metres, and an international programme now formally partnered with ASIFA and promoted at Annecy. By fusing rights trading with the manufacturing power of China's toy capital, it has become the place where Chinese animation IP meets the factories and licensees that carry it to market, and a flagship of the Greater Bay Area's cultural industries.

The fair's summer timing and public dimension broaden its reach beyond trade visitors. Editions are scheduled in the school summer holiday, and Dongguan supports them with citywide animation-related programming — exhibitions, concerts, camping festivals and bazaars across the city, and in 2026 a month-long programme spanning the Shipai centre, the Dongguan Exhibition Center and the Minying International Trade Center. The 10th edition's 70,000 animation enthusiasts, alongside its 2,000 professional purchasers, illustrate the dual audience the fair has cultivated from the start: a professional copyright market by day and a popular celebration of animation culture around it. That combination sustains public and political support for an event whose underlying purpose — building Dongguan's IP economy — is long-term and industrial.