IDW launches on-demand content studio for geeks

San Diego-based IDW Entertainment (IDWE) has launched a on-demand- and digital-focused production and distribution studio targeting “geek culture”.

IDW Digital Studio will produce original, on-demand content for ‘geek’ audiences across digital media.

It will target fan bases with “a fresh, fan accessible and highly creative emphasis to creating, managing and delivering original content and fan engagement services”.

The studio aims to work for all current and upcoming digital platforms, and will aim to create and build franchises for them.

Further to that, execs will look to IDW’s extensive back catalogue of existing franchises such as Wyonna Earp (pictured) and Locke and Key, and existing talent relationships to create content for 18-49s familiar with such brands.

On the distribution side, IDW Digital Studio will focus on “long-term digital network arrangements” that allow for the content to hit traditional and newer digital platforms. Owned and operated channels in “ecosystems friendly to fan engagement” are also in the plans.

“People are consuming media differently and have very diverse expectations for their entertainment experiences than they did just a few years ago,” said IDWE president David Ozer.

“With IDW Digital Studios, we believe we can deliver an entertainment experience that speaks to today’s sophisticated audiences, introduces truly fresh and creative talent and concepts to the marketplace and then makes that resulting content available on the platforms that make the most sense for that content.”

IDWE launched in 2013, and has since placed critical hit Wyonna Earp on Syfy in the US and Spike in the UK and Australia; and worked on detective series Dirk Gently, which is for BBC America in the States and Netflix elsewhere.

Both series have been recommissioned for second runs later this year.