camila September 2, 2021

SINGAPORE (THE BUSINESS TIMES) – Some in the collectors’ circle call the brand the pride of Singapore. In 1997, Ben Ang and his brother Seng took $1,000 meant for polytechnic school fees and invested it in Xenomorph, a collectible toy store in Bras Basah Complex.

It was a big step for the pair of comic book fans who had dreams of one day making a mark on the pop culture scene. But the dream flickered for over a decade and nearly went out. Seng had even settled on a life of driving a taxi if their plans failed.

Instead, the brothers today run an award-winning global luxury collectibles business that has attracted the interest of Temasek subsidiary Heliconia Capital. The investment company has taken a 9.2 per cent stake in the business, according to regulatory filings. The investment amount was undisclosed.

Ben and Seng’s creation, XM Studios, was launched in 2012 together with their oldest brother Clair and two business partners. The company designs and produces handcrafted, porcelain statues of characters from various pop culture brands, such as Marvel, DC and Transformers. Each statue is individually painted by hand.

It took over 20 years and tens of thousands of paint jobs for the brothers to hone their skills. The co-founders decided that licensing was a viable business model and knocked on every door till they secured a Marvel licence to produce collectible statues for South-east Asia.

Today, it has 12 main licences including those for Star Wars, Batman, Justice League, Mickey & Friends, and fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons. It’s also producing collectibles of iconic Japanese characters from Godzilla, Ultraman and Sanrio.

“We’ve known the company for quite a while,” Heliconia’s chief executive Derek Lau told The Business Times (BT). “And each time we invest, it’s about timing and inflexion point, and whether there’s strategic value. Whether it’s because of the pandemic or not, global consumer spending has shifted from services to products.”

Consumer wallet size has expanded and affluent consumers have been spending on luxury items for years, Mr Lau said. With XM Studios having helped intellectual property (IP) owners to capture this market, he believes the company now has the experience to expand to other IP verticals such as sports and entertainment.

Other investors in the business include Japanese investment bank Risa Partners and Singapore-based ICH Capital. Regulatory filings show that Heliconia bought its stake in the company through secondary transactions in which five shareholders partially divested their shares, and one fully exited.

Mr Ben Ang, who leads XM Studios as its CEO, told BT that there was a surge in demand during the pandemic. According to filings, revenue doubled to $16.9 million for the year ended December 2020 while profit after tax was $4.2 million.

Some of XM Studios’ collectibles, with prices ranging from $1,000 to $6,000, are known for selling out within minutes.

Mr Ang said about 30 per cent of revenue comes from the US and Europe, another 30 per cent from China and another 30 per cent from South-east Asia. A potential expansion of licensing rights could mean an entry into the Middle East and India.

The Covid-19 outbreak was hard on XM Studios. With comic conventions around the world cancelled, the group lost a critical marketing channel. But it quickly expanded its online presence through Instagram, Twitter and Weibo to engage its community of fans. It’s also venturing into producing podcasts.

A new category of consumers emerged strongly during this time. “There’s a long tail of customers that we have yet to target, which is casual buyers who just want to buy one piece of artwork to display,” said Mr Ang.

With the “premium mass market” in mind, XM Studios is in talks with its partners to come up with products at a more affordable price range of $200 to $300.

The bigger opportunity could be expansion beyond comic book and movie collectibles.

“The world is so dark sometimes that people just want to live a life of looking at their heroes. These heroes can be extended to a second vertical like sports heroes – Michael Jordan and Ronaldo – and pop culture celebrities like Korean group BTS,” said Mr Lau.

In fact, Heliconia has made an introduction between XM Studios and its other portfolio company One Championship, which manages several personalities in the mixed martial arts scene. XM is also close to signing a contract with a major sports league.

Heliconia plans to help bring more strategic investors on board the company, while leveraging Temasek’s global network in the consumer lifestyle and technology space. It could aid XM Studios as it ventures into the hot market of non-fungible tokens.

In November, XM Studios will open its first experiential concept store and office at Kitchener Complex, spanning a floor area of 12,000 square feet.

And with films like Wonder Woman and Frozen igniting the female consumer market, the company is turning its attention to women-centric collectibles. Currently, about 95 per cent of its customers are male.

Asked how it intends to scale its production as the company expands, Mr Ang said: “We are currently working with nine contracted factories and they are still not fully utilised. We have an internal process regarding production, which we can easily replicate with new factories to increase our production scale.”