Youku Tudou, China’s largest video hosting website, announced the creation of its own film studio Thursday in a move to capture a larger slice of the film industry.

中国最大的视频网站优酷土豆(Youku Tudou)周四宣布将设立自己的电影工作室，以便从中国电影市场分得更大份额。

Victor Koo, chairman and chief executive of the company, said the film division, Heyi Film, would produce eight films per year destined¹ for the big screen and a further nine aimed to premiere on the internet. The group, which last week announced a loss of $26m for the second quarter despite increased revenues, has not revealed how much it plans to spend on the project.

优酷土豆首席执行官古永锵(Victor Koo)表示，这个名为合一影业(Heyi Film)的新电影公司将每年制作八部大屏幕电影，还会制作九部首发于互联网的影片。就在上周，优酷土豆曾宣布，尽管第二季度营收出现增长，该季度合计却亏损了2600万美元。目前，该集团并未披露打算往合一影业投入多少资金。

Mr Koo said Youku had $1.6bn in cash to spend after a $1.2bn investment by ecommerce group Alibaba in April. “We’re very strong,” he said.

古永铿表示，在今年4月获得电子商务集团阿里巴巴(Alibaba)的12亿美元投资后，优酷土豆目前可支配的现金高达16亿美元。他说：“我们的现金非常充裕。”

Youku Tudou, formed by the merger² of China’s two largest video sites in 2012, claims 500m users.

优酷土豆由中国两家最大的视频网站在2012年合并而成，声称拥有5亿用户。

Youku had been making its own content since 2009, starting with “microfilms” lasting³ a few minutes, and last year helped produce eight feature films that had a combined box office of 2bn, Mr Koo said. It planned a number of new releases in the coming months such as Golden Era, a film about China writers in the 1920s scheduled for release in October, and The Taking of Tiger Mountain, a 3D epic⁴.

古永铿表示，优酷自2009年开始就一直在制作自己的视频，起初是长度只有几分钟的“微电影”。去年该集团帮助制作了八部电影，票房总收入达20亿元。在今后几个月，它计划出品多部新影片，包括定于今年10月发行的《黄金时代》(Golden Era)（该片讲述了上世纪20年代中国作家的故事），以及3D史诗巨作《智取威虎山》(The Taking of Tiger Mountain)。

The Continent, another big budget film partly financed by Youku, has made Rmb627m this year and is still in cinemas.

今年，优酷参与投资的另一部大预算电影是《后会无期》(The Continent)，该片的票房已达6.27亿人民币，目前仍在上映。

Virtually all of China’s video hosting sites make their own content, and this year has seen a trend to build separate studios or to acquire content producers. In July Iqiyi, which counts Baidu, China’s largest search engine, as an investor⁵, launched an in-house studio with eight films in the works. In June Alibaba completed the acquisition of a majority stake in ChinaVision , a video content maker⁶.

中国几乎所有视频网站都在制作自己的视频内容，今年甚至出现了一个新潮流，即这些网站成立独立的电影工作室或收购内容制作商。今年7月，依靠中国最大搜索引擎百度的投资，爱奇艺(Iqiyi)启动了一个内部工作室，正在制作八部影片。今年6月，阿里巴巴收购了视频内容制作商——文化中国传播(ChinaVision Media Group)的多数股权。

The bid to move from small smartphone screens to big screens, and the reverse, is driven partly by strong growth over the past three years in films. China’s industry is the second largest after the United States, expected to gross between Rmb28bn to Rmb30bn this year.

过去三年，中国电影业强劲增长，推动业界从智能手机屏幕向大屏幕——或者相反——的迁徙。目前，中国是仅次于美国的第二大电影市场，预计今年票房总额将在280亿人民币到300亿人民币之间。

Cinemas are multiplying, at an average rate of 18 screens a day. Last year China added more screens that the total in France.

中国的电影院数量也在成倍增长，平均每天增加18块银幕。中国去年一年增加的银幕数就超过了法国的电影银幕总数。

Allen Zhu, Heyi Film chief executive, said the studio planned five films based on hit internet series such as Yes Boss, Surprise and Miss Puff⁷.

合一影业首席执行官朱辉龙(Allen Zhu)表示，该公司还根据红极一时的网络剧制作了五部电影，其中包括《报告老板》(Yes Boss)、《万万没想到》(Surprise)和《泡芙小姐》(Miss Puff)。

Producing films for smartphone screens required a different approach, with smartphones running videos getting very hot after 20 mins, said Mr Zhu. Surprise, broken into six-minute episodes, had gained 700m views.

朱辉龙表示，为智能手机制作电影不同于制作大银幕电影，因为智能手机在观看视频20分钟后就会非常烫手。为此，吸引了7亿观众的《万万没想到》就分成了长度为6分钟的小段视频。