Vietnam’s Beta Media and Japan’s Aeon Entertainment have forged a joint venture that will plough $200m (VND5tn) into 50 premium cinema complexes in Vietnam and see the duo enter film production and distribution, opening up new horizons for the local film industry.
The first cinema complex under the Aeon Beta Cinema brand is expected to open its doors in 2025, with all 50 complexes to be built in provinces across Vietnam in the same year.
This strategic partnership leverages on the expertise of both parties. Aeon Entertainment is Japan’s largest cinema chain in terms of the number of theatres and screens, with 96 cinemas and 821 screens. Established in 1991, it is a subsidiary of the Aeon Group in Japan. In recent years, the group has gained a foothold in Vietnam after investing heavily in its retail sector.
“We have strong confidence in the Vietnamese film industry,” said Nobuyuki Fujiwara, chairman of Aeon Entertainment at an event in Ho Chi Minh City to launch the joint venture. “The Vietnamese film industry will continue to grow, and there will be many opportunities for us from Japan to contribute.”
Beta Media has a deep understanding of the Vietnamese market, having developed 20 Beta Cinemas nationwide since 2014. With a youthful design, it maintains an affordable ticket price of just over $2 (VND 50,000) on average and serves up to 6 million customers annually. Last year, its revenue grew 150% compared to pre-Covid 2019, indicating a strong recovery from the pandemic. It will continue to serve the mass market segment in Vietnam through its existing Beta Cinemas brand.
The company was founded by entrepreneur Bui Quang Minh, also nicknamed Shark Minh Beta after he participated in reality show Shark Tank Vietnam.
“Besides investing in cinema complexes, the new venture is also investing in film production and distribution. In the near future, Aeon and Beta will certainly have a strong commitment to developing the Vietnamese film industry,” said Minh.
The new company aims to distribute Vietnamese, Japanese and international films in the Vietnamese market.
The press event was attended by prominent guests such as Lê Thị Thu Hà, head of the film dissemination department of Vietnam’s Cinema Department, directors Charlie Nguyen and Phan Gia Nhat Linh and actress-director Kathy Uyen.
It was only two decades ago that Vietnamese authorities allowed the private sector to start making films. With a population of around 100 million, Vietnam’s box office had been growing by about 10% year-on-year from the mid-2010s, when the number of cinema screens surged due to investment by South Korean companies CJ ENM and Lotte Entertainment, and local chain Galaxy Cinema, which is backed partly by Golden Screen Cinemas’ Malaysian parent company PPB.
Last year saw a string of successes for the country’s film industry with Ha Le Diem’s documentary Children Of The Mist making history as the first Vietnamese documentary feature to be shortlisted for an Oscar; Pham Thien An winning the Camera d’Or at Cannes with Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell; and a notable increase in the local box office with titles such as Tran Thanh’s The House Of No Man and Ly Hai’s Face Off 6: The Ticket Of Destiny.
The upswing continues this year, with more record-breaking box office hits such as Mai and Face Off 7: One Wish and further Vietnamese art films gaining international recognition, including Pham Ngoc Lan’s Cu Li Never Cries, winner of the best feature prize in the Berlinale’s Panorama section, Truong Minh Quy’s Viet And Nam from Cannes’ Un Certain Regard and Duong Dieu Linh’s Don’t Cry, Butterfly set to premiere in Venice Critics’ Week in September.