Paris-based prodco Ellipse Animation is expanding into creating webtoons. (These digital comics made for smartphones have origins in South Korea and a lucrative market behind them.) 

The move is designed to capitalize on increased demand for this entertainment genre and the animated adaptations it tends to yield. Worldwide, webtoons generated US$3.7 billion in revenue in 2022, and that figure could balloon to US$60 billion by 2030, according to Amsterdam-based consulting firm BearingPoint. 

Ellipse’s long-term goal is to create a webtoon industry in France, which is the world’s fourth-largest market for them after Korea, Japan and the US, said the studio’s managing director Caroline Audebert in a release.

To start the push, Ellipse has launched a production division out of its Angoulême-based studio that will offer services to European publishers looking to turn their IPs into webtoons. The unit’s first projects include a collection of four original French titles for teens that will drop weekly episodes on Ellipse parentco Média-Participations’ ONO webtoon platform. The ONO app has been downloaded more than 350,000 times since launching in March 2023. 

Ellipse eventually plans to create a whole library of original webtoons in Angoulême, as well as adapting its existing animated films and series into digital comics. Shows that could get this treatment sooner rather than later include 2D-animated series Living with Dad and Kid Lucky, along with a fantasy-adventure series for tweens called Dreamland (pictured).