YUNLIN, Taiwan, April 1 (Reuters) – A group of Taiwanese puppeteers are looking to use non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, to help bring their traditional art form into the modern age and keep it relevant for a new public.

NFTs are crypto assets representing a digital item such as an image, video, or even landing in virtual worlds, with the prices of some rising so rapidly in the past year that speculators around the world have sometimes “flipped” them. in a few days for a profit.

Pili International Multimedia (8450.TWO), which makes Taiwan’s longest-running TV show featuring the puppets at its studio in Yunlin County, central Taiwan, says it wants to use NFTs as another source of revenue.

“The kind of imagination that everyone has today for the online world is growing so rapidly that we are almost unable to grasp it,” said Seika Huang, brand manager of Pili.

“Instead of sitting on the sidelines, the best approach is to move forward and fully understand what’s going on. That’s the quickest way to catch up.”

Pili has thousands of glove puppet characters, a traditional part of Taiwanese street entertainment culture that tells colorful and highly stylized stories of heroic courage and romance, often with martial arts.

The puppets are painstakingly created and skillfully manipulated during the filming of the shows, with costumes sewn and locks of hair meticulously put in place.

Pili said four of their puppet characters have been made into digital versions and 30,000 sets have been sold as NFTs.

The company declined to reveal profit sharing with the marketplace platform, but said pricing for each set starts at $40, which translates to revenue generated of at least $1.2 million. since their listing in early February.

Marketing technology company VeVe, which is responsible for selling the NFTs, said the stories of the puppet heroes resonate with younger audiences and could attract overseas fans of superhero movies, such as those based on Marvel Comics characters.

“Westerners really love our martial arts heroes and kung fu,” said Raymond Chou, VeVe brand manager.

Huang, who said their initial rosters sold out seconds after launching on VeVe, is now working to turn up to 50 more puppet characters into NFTs, potentially adding another million dollar revenue stream for the studio.

Reporting by Ann Wang; Written by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Karishma Singh

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