Montreal: Speaking at Cinar Films’ agm earlier this month, ceo Micheline Charest said the company ‘has the corporate culture’ to access the educational market and intends to acquire a u.s. educational supplementary publisher with annual revenues of $10 million or more by the end of this year.

The acquisition bid coincides with a major expansion of Cinar’s library, which increased by 400 half-hour episodes in 1996.

Revenues from the Cinar library jumped 54% in ’96 to $13.9 million, making library sales, at 25%, the company’s second major source of revenue.

With the $23.7 million acquisition of the 232 half-hour FilmFair library, revenues from Cinar library sales are expected to grow 45% in ’97 to $20 million. The mid-term projection is for 25% to 30% annual growth to over $40 million by the year 2000.

Charest says programs like Wimzie’s House, seen on Radio-Canada, cbc and pbs this fall, are developed specifically with school and community curricula in mind.

‘Teachers are very vigilant on this point. That’s why Disney hasn’t succeeded in expanding into the classroom. They (teachers) don’t want Pocahontas teaching math,’ she says.

The benefits of a publishing acquisition will roll out once ‘the computerization of the classroom’ is widespread, she says.

Hasanain Panju, Cinar vp and cfo, says the library is ‘the key to the success of this company,’ in large measure because gross margins from library sales are superior to other activities, 50% in Cinar’s case.

Cinar has 15 ongoing and new productions slated for ’97, with 11 properties in development.

Animation series in development at Cinar in ’97 include Ripley’s Believe it or Not!, IC Shadow, MumbleBumble and Mona the Vampire.

MumbleBumble is beginning its design phase and Ripley and IC Shadow are in presentation mode, with talks ongoing with coproducers and broadcasters, says Cassandra Schafhausen, vp animation production and development.

IC Shadow is based on a Laura Seeley book series introduced to Cinar by Artistic Connections in Atlanta, Georgia.

IC Shadow, the key character, is a ‘mentor of imagination’ who helps children solve their own problems through allegorical and fantastic experiences, ‘as opposed to having to look to superheroes.’

MumbleBumble is a five-minute preschool series property featuring a hippo and his chicken and frog friends. ‘It sets up a kind of a fun play-pattern forum for children to create things both out of their imaginations and environment,’ says Schafhausen.

Mona the Vampire is based on a u.k. book series and features a precocious little girl much admired by colleagues. It’s aimed at five- to 10-year-olds.

‘The goal is to be in production on these (series) in ’97, by the end of the second quarter, beginning of the third quarter,’ says Schafhausen.

Cinar’s ’97 live-action development slate includes two tv series: Cirque, a coproduction with Montreal’s Telemagick, and Fury, the latter in association with PolyGram Filmed Entertainment, says Patricia Lavoie, vp, live-action production and development.

New projects include Un hiver de tourmente, a tv movie based on the Quebec children’s novel Savage Messiah; a miniseries in development with Toronto producer Bernard Zukerman based on the story of a terrifying Charley Manson-like religious cult; Sally Marshall is Not an Alien, an mow coproduction with Australia’s Infinity Pictures; G’Day Michelle, a new family film with Tucker Films in New Zealand; and Are You Afraid of the Dark? The Movie with Nickelodeon and Paramount Pictures.

Cinar expects a decision from Paramount later this year.

Cinar president Ron Weinberg says the deal represents a step in a new direction. In addition to a producer’s fee, the ‘branding’ impact of a theatrical release would greatly benefit the 65-episode tv series, he says.

On the sales front, London, Eng.-based David Ferguson, Cinar’s new vp Europe, a former head of international sales at the bbc and head of coproduction for Nelvana Enterprises, will be running a sales team covering all of Europe. Ferguson has also been named FilmFair’s managing director.

Weinberg says Latin American sales are up dramatically in the past two years and more is expected this year.

‘Licence fees are going up. The licence periods are getting shorter. We have more flexibility in moving programs from satellite to cable to traditional broadcasting channels.’

Sales to the u.s. make up 30% of all Cinar sales, says Weinberg. ‘That is the point. We don’t want to be beholden to any one market.’

Much of the company’s European revenues are recorded as coproduction financing revenues. ‘When you look at what we have on our production slate this year we’re saying it’s $65 million, but it’s really $86 million if you add in the coproducer’s share,’ he says.

Cinar revenues rose 38% to $57.9 million in ’96 with net earnings up over 60% to $8.5 million. Revenue projections for ’97 are in the $80 million range.