iQiyi has been deeply involved in online entertainment content for fifteen years. Its hit content, such as "The Knockout" and "My Altay," has shown a significant online-to-offline effect. "The Knockout" boosted the popularity of Jiangmen pig's feet noodles, and "My Altay" triggered a surge in visits to its filming locations, proving the bridging role of high-quality IP in connecting online and offline. Based on this, we have begun to develop offline theme parks and IP derivative businesses.

Industry Trends

We believe that now is an opportune time to leverage offline entertainment. Looking back at history, the rise of Hollywood in the US coincided with the period after the Great Depression, and the global popularity of Japanese anime began during its period of economic slowdown. Post-pandemic, the recovery of the tourism industry has been strong, and consumer attitudes are also changing, placing more emphasis on emotional value and emotional connection beyond product functionality.

Why is iQIYI entering this industry?

When entering a new business, we generally ask three questions. First, is the industry large enough? Second, are there any problems in the industry that haven't been well addressed? Third, if iQIYI enters, can we make significant improvements to the existing problems in this industry? If we can answer these three questions, we believe we can enter the industry and work with our industry colleagues and partners to improve industry efficiency and enhance user experience.

We see some areas for improvement in existing theme parks, such as high capital investment and long return periods in traditional models; a relative scarcity of attractive local IP; slower content iteration speed due to scale limitations; and challenges related to high operating costs and management efficiency. However, we believe that iQIYI's core capabilities can bring efficiency improvements to the industry.

1. Continuous Hit IP Production Capacity: We rely on the platform's "horse racing mechanism," investing over 10 billion yuan annually in collaboration with top creators, ensuring the stable output of top-tier content (such as successful cases like "The Legend of Tang Dynasty," "The Knockout," "Love Between Fairy and Devil," and "The World").

2. Solving the Problem of Off-Season Operations: A crucial aspect of tourism projects is off-season operation. iQIYI launches major drama promotions every month. In the future, iQIYI theme parks will become the core carriers of these activities. By scheduling activities on weekdays, mid-week, or during traditional off-seasons, we can effectively attract traffic to the parks.

3. Technology-Driven Cost Reduction, Efficiency Improvement, and Experience Upgrade: The film and television industry has always been technology-driven. Virtual production technology transforms key scenes from dramas into digital assets, which can be seamlessly reused in offline theme park construction, significantly reducing the cost of real-world scenes and ensuring scene fidelity, while enhancing fan immersion. We have been developing "Full-Sense Theaters" since 2016, and in 2018, we produced our first product, "Resident Evil." Through continuous technological optimization, we have gradually launched well-known products such as "Wind from Luoyang" and "The Legend of Tang Dynasty." We are also developing customized products based on local culture. We hope to use methods that young people enjoy, with stronger interaction, to allow more young people to experience different folk customs and history.

What is iQIYI Theme Park?

We position the iQIYI Theme Park project as a medium-sized park of 10,000-20,000 square meters, targeting a core customer group aged 16-35. The park integrates VR full-sense theaters, immersive light and shadow, real-person NPC interaction, and real-scene recreations. Our first park is expected to open in Yangzhou in the fourth quarter of this year.

The above are some of my strategic thoughts on offline theme parks. We sincerely hope to work with partners in various professional fields within the industry to jointly create a connection between online IP and offline experiences, an emotional hub.