Future is clear after London spectacular

At the Olympic Games opening ceremony on Friday, more than 70,000 paddle-shaped LED tablets installed on each spectators' seat, lit the stadium, making London Bowl the largest digital display on Earth.

But while all eyes were on the London landmark displaying the spectacular digital animation, it was a Chinese company, Crystal CG, which made the magic happen.

Crystal specializes in large-scale computer graphics, providing visuals for events such as stadium extravaganzas and graphics for TV networks.

But with London behind it, the Beijing-based company is now gearing up to win its next big customer amid growing competition and weak demand.

"Digitalized visual content packaging is a very young industry globally, and we need international events such as the London Olympics to showcase what we are capable of," said Lu Zhenggang, founder and chairman of Crystal.

With about 3,000 employees worldwide, the company said it will continue to invest in innovation and talent recruitment.

Its deal with London was struck in 2009 when the company won a bid to supply digitalized animation content to the organizing committee.

Prior to that, the company demonstrated what it could do at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, animating a traditional Chinese wash painting on a 145-meter-long LED scroll lying at the center of the National Stadium in Beijing, better known as the Bird's Nest.

"Crystal took all its experience in the three-dimensional digital area from the Beijing Olympics to the opening ceremony in London," said Michael Payne, former head of the marketing division of the International Olympic Committee.

Payne said the growing innovation, design and quality of Chinese companies indicate that they will increasingly be manufacturing for their own clients, as opposed to doing outsourced work for others.

"There is no doubt that leading Chinese companies will become leading brands across the world," Payne said.

However, industry insiders are worried that small market scale and weak demand may pose a threat to the survival of computer graphics content providers.

"It will take at least two years before the demand for digital visual package services starts to grow, and we should probably wait longer for the boost in demand," Lu said.

His comments were echoed by others.

"China's computer graphics industry is in the primary stage, and the industry will only grow when a fully functioning industrial chain is formed," said Deng Bohong, managing director of Shenzhen Dans Digital Technology Co Ltd.

"But we are not seeing the formation of this chain anytime soon."

Deng and his 40-man company are famous for winning numerous international awards over the past decade. The company mainly produces computer graphics content for real estate developers and filmmakers.

But even the top end of the industry is struggling, with increasing numbers of local computer graphics workshops luring small clients away with cheaper rates and eating up bigger players' profit margins.

But the government, which says cultural and creative industries is important to help boost the nation's slowing GDP, is also keen to give the industry a hand.

The central government has approved a series of policies supporting the development of the culture industry since 2011.

The nation's culture industry is expected to see an annual growth rate of more than 20 percent during the 12th Five-year Plan (2011-15) period, increasing the gross added value of the industry to between 800 billon yuan and 900 billion yuan ($125 billion to $141 billion), said Li Xiaojie, vice-minister of culture, said earlier this year.

"We welcome the policies that have been set with a long-term perspective, the industry will benefit from them," said Deng from Dans.

gaoyuan@chinadaily.com.cn