Vertical drama is entering the mainstream conversation of the Australian screen industry, with Cairns Crocodiles set to host a dedicated microdrama panel bringing together platform executives, broadcasters and content creators at the annual APAC Festival of Creativity.
Tim Orr, general manager of leading microdrama company COL Group International, will appear at the Queensland event alongside Nikya Hutchings, NITV’s executive producer of commercials and partnerships, in a session titled Maestro of Microdrama. The panel will explore how the format is reshaping storytelling habits, brand integration and creative opportunities across the region.
“Australia has been quietly outperforming every other market on (microdrama platform) FlareFlow for some time now in terms of revenue per user, high viewership and faster new user conversion,” Mr Oh said. “To give you a sense of the scale, the payout rate for new users in Australia is nearly 20%, more than double that of most other developed markets.”
“Vertical is not coming to Australia,” Mr Orr added. “It already exists here, and it works better here than in most other places in the world. The question now is how do we build it together?”
Hutchings recently won the Grand Prize in Media Sales and Account Management at the B&T 30 Under 30 Awards. She oversees commercial content for NITV and contributes to SBS’s Australia Explained series. “Microdramas are changing how culture is represented on our phones, making it an exciting meeting place for culture, technology and money,” she said. “I’m looking forward to sitting down with Tim O in Cairns to discuss how vertical storytelling can open up new opportunities and make room for more voices, and what that means in practice for creators, broadcasters and brands.”
This format tends to be discussed in Australian industry circles as a mobile or platform phenomenon rather than as storytelling. Catherine de Clare, co-curator of film and screen tracks at Cairns Crocodiles, said: “There is disruption, but the future is not yet written.” “We want creators and business leaders to start thinking about what opportunities are out there and what kind of world they want to build.”
The panel will also address the issue of brands moving toward microdramas, as some analysts predict the format will reach box office success on par with Hollywood movies this year. Located at the crossroads of the Australian and Asian media markets, Cairns Crocodiles has expanded in recent years as a venue for cross-regional trading and format development.
