DHX Media and DreamWorks Animation have inked a five-year deal to coproduce 130 half-hour original episodes of animated kids content.

The programming will be produced out of DHX Media’s Halifax- and Vancouver-based DHX Studios animation studios. The content will air on DHX Television’s suite of channels, including Family, Family Jr. and the recently rebranded Family CHRGD and Telemagino. DHX Media will handle the Canadian distribution of the content, while DreamWorks will handle worldwide distribution.

Along with the coproduction pact, DHX Media also announced it has licenced more than 1,000 half-hours of programming from DreamWorks Animation. That content, which includes series such as All Hail King Julien, The Croods and Dragons: Race to the Edge, will start airing on across DHX Television’s suite of channels as early as June 2016. With the deal, DHX Television becomes the exclusive Canadian television network for DreamWorks Animation television programming.

Finally, along with the aforementioned deals, DHX Media has also entered into an agreement with AwesomenessTV to licence 300 half-hours of teen content for exclusive broadcast in Canada on Family Channel. AwesomenessTV is a multi-platform media co which focuses on producing content for Gen Z audiences, and is majority-owned by Dreamworks Animation.

These series will air on Family’s new teen programming block F2N, set to launch in January 2016. DHX Media will handle the distribution of AwesomenessTV content in Canada across all platforms, including SVOD and OTT services. The AwesomenessTV deal builds upon a previously announced original development and production agreement inked by the two companies in August of this year. At that time, DHX Media said it was licensing three AwesomenessTV series for Family: the sketch comedy series AwesomenessTV (20 x 30 minutes), the reality series Make Me Over (20 x 30 minutes) and the docu-series Cheerleaders (26 x 30 minutes).

This latest partnership between DreamWorks and DHX Media comes after the Halifax-based company lost its Disney licencing deal in April to Corus Entertainment. This September, Corus launched the Disney Channel for the first time in Canada. Following the loss of the Disney deal, DHX Television indicated it would aim to bolster its original programming slate for its suite of channels. Other original programs recently greenlit by DHX Television include Fresh TV’s Backstage, Aircraft Pictures and Dolphin Entertainment’s The Wonderful Wayneys and Banger Films’ Savvy.

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