Xu Baofeng, director of the Chinese Culture Translation and Studies Support, speaks at the 2018 Animation for the Spring Festival: Happy Chinese New Year & China Readers' Club event on Feb 9, 2018. [Photo provided to Chinaculture.org]

Bai Jun, director of the Intellectual Property Planning Department at NetEase, explained the current challenges faced by domestic animation industry.

"Outstanding cartoonists are still a scarce resource in China," he said. "Online comics need to cope with the ever-changing interests of our readers."

Wang Ning, owner of Beijing Total Vision Culture Spreads Co Ltd, introduced a new possibility of business cooperation and cultural exchange, which is for domestic cartoonists to work around a Chinese story with foreign cartoonists.

The company recently gained the cartoon adaptation rights to 15 novels and short stories by Liu Cixin, the renowned Chinese science fiction writer and winner of the Hugo Award in 2015.

"We are looking forward to introducing more Chinese works to a global readership," Wang said.