Hailed as the Sesame Street of Japan, preschool series Be Ponkickies is heading to the US and Canada for the first time, thanks to an exclusive deal inked by online bilingual channel Oznoz with Japanese terrestrial broadcaster Fuji Television Kids Entertainment.

Terms of the deal include the streaming rights to 26 half-hour episodes of Be Ponkickies in Japanese that will sit alongside additional Japanese-dubbed Oznoz content including Sesame Street, Babar, Ruby Gloom and On-Chan.
The child-safe, preschool-focused VOD platform founded by Big Bad Boo’s Aly Jetha and Shabnam Rezaei has also acquired the right to dub Be Ponkickies into English and other languages.

Oznoz customers can view the first Be Ponkickies episode for free and then stream the series at www.oznoz.com or via the Oznoz iOS or Android app.

Be Ponkickies has endured a remarkable 40-year run on Fuji Television Network and BS Fuji, and Oznoz expects it will appeal to a broad audience, especially Japanese-American families and kids and adults who are learning Japanese.

The deal follows Oznoz’s multilingual mega-deal with Nelvana for 400 half hours of programming, including popular shows Franklin, Babar and the Adventures of Badou, Beyblade, Bakugan, Scaredy Squirrel and Ruby Gloom in languages such as Arabic, Hindi, Mandarin, Japanese, French, Korean and German.