WPT Ups Ante With Launch Of Chinese Poker Tournament

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WPT Enterprises Inc., producer of the televised World Poker Tour, is making headway in a huge gaming frontier: It is heading to China this fall.


WPT and China Leisure Sports Administrative Center, announced recently that WPT will be the exclusive marketing partner for the launch of China’s first-ever National Traktor Poker Tournament.


China has extremely stringent gaming laws; this is the first time a poker brand has been sanctioned in China and the five-year partnership is a landmark agreement in China’s leisure sports history.


The tour will focus on growing the sport of Traktor Poker, known as Tuo La Ji, China’s most popular poker game. Traktor is a style of poker typically played with four players and two decks of cards where kings, tens and fives hold the highest point value.


WPT will pay a yearly fee to the leisure sports administrative group starting at $505,000. It will increase 10 percent annually for the remaining four years of the term. The deal was about nine months in the making; there’s been no word on the stakes for tournament participants.


“People have come out of the woodwork wanting to be part of this because everyone is trying to find a way to participate in the largest market in the world,” said Steve Lipscomb, chief executive of WPT, which has headquarters on L.A.’s Miracle Mile. “What we will look to do there, like here in the U.S., is consumer products, sponsorships and the like. There are a lot of ways to monetize this. We see it as a long term play there.”


More than half of the Chinese population knows how to play Traktor Poker, and at any given time, Traktor Poker counts for nearly half of the online poker activity on Ourgame.com, the leading website for such games in China and the official online partner of the Tour.


The leisure sports administrative group, China’s governing body of leisure sports including billiards and ping pong, adopted formal rules in 2002 in order to unify the many local styles of Traktor and allow for better management of the sport.


“In the past years, Traktor poker matches were organized in many provinces and cities as Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu with thousands of participants. And (the number) of users who play online poker games are even increasing more rapidly,” said Xing Xiaoquan, director of the leisure sports administrative group.



THR ESQ Gets Axed

The Hollywood Reporter pulled the plug last week on its year-old Web site that focused on entertainment law.


The announcement was made in an e-mail sent by Publisher John Kilcullen and Senior Vice President Linda McCutcheon that read, in part: “Moving forward, THR, ESQ. content will now be integrated into THR.com as a dedicated channel continuing to serve the information needs of the media and entertainment law community, while also broadening the content distribution to THR.com’s expanding audience. This move will allow us to provide a more robust service on THR.com, strengthen the depth and breadth of its content, and increase its audience reach.”


According to staffers, the announcement came as a shock, with no warning or explanation. Save editor Matt Belloni, who will be integrated into The Hollywood Reporter’s editorial staff, the remaining ESQ staffers’ last day at work will be Aug. 31.



APM Inks Distribution Deal

APM Music, the U.S.’ largest production music library providing music for use in film, television, advertising and new media production signed a digital and mobile distribution agreement with Amuse Entertainment Group B.V. to deliver its music catalog through Amuse’s global distribution network. The pilot phase of the program will see the initial ingestion of 500 tracks selected from APM’s 225,000-track catalog, which includes such high-profile libraries as KPM, Carlton and Electronic Arts, libraries that hold a combination of genres including well-known 1960s TV tracks, jazz, pop and video game music.


APM Music is a joint venture of EMI Music Publishing and Universal Music Publishing and is based in Los Angeles; Amuse is an online and mobile content distributor for the entertainment and advertising industries.


Amuse will provide distribution of the content initially through the mobile channels it powers, and then expand into third party and digital channels over the next year. Amuse will also leverage its ad agency relationships to integrate the music content into interactive mobile marketing and promotional campaigns. Under the deal, APM retains control over both its content and permissions relating to distribution by territory and channel. Amuse’s platform will manage distribution relationships in the company’s network and APM will get consolidated reports on usages and transactions of their content assets.



Staff reporter Anne Riley-Katz at can be reached at ariley-

[email protected]

or (323) 549-5225, ext 225.

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