BBC Studios and LINE TV today announced their first partnership to bring BBC Earth and BBC First on to the Taiwanese OTT platform, which boasts the greatest share of original content in Taiwan.

The partnership brings the world’s most iconic natural history and science documentary brand, BBC Earth, to Taiwan, treating audiences to the most extensive catalogue in natural history, including Frozen Planet, Planet Earth, Blue Planet and a plethora of other epic nature documentaries. In addition, BBC First, home of the premium  British drama brand, will bring a number of popular titles to Taiwan, including the world’s most sought-after series of Sherlock, Maigret and Call the Midwife, all of which are available on LINE TV’s BBC Earth and BBC First branded zones from July 1. This new partnership will provide local viewers with a much greater range of first-rate content, as well as an upgraded mobile entertainment experience.

“This is the first time that BBC Studios has cooperated with LINE TV to bring two of our brands, the natural history and science documentary portfolio of BBC Earth and the British drama catalogue of BBC First, to Taiwan,” said Ding Ke, Senior Vice President and General Manager of BBC Studios Greater China. “It also represents the growing audience of our content in Taiwan. We look forward to bringing BBC Earth’s sensational nature documentaries and BBC First’s award-winning British dramas to Taiwan audiences through LINE TV’s huge user base and extensive market influence in Taiwan.”

LINE TV has 5 million monthly active users and more than 10,000 hours of licensed content including Taiwan drama, Chinese drama, animation, Korean drama and original dramas.   “’Product’ and ‘Content’ represent the lifeblood of OTT platforms,” said Chen Li-ren, CEO of LINE TV. “The LINE TV platform is defined by its wide range of films and programs and is therefore honored to cooperate with BBC Studios, one of the world’s leading content providers, to further enrich our high-quality content. LINE TV’s products are also comparable to international platforms’, providing a perfect user interface, and continue to optimize and upgrade, to bring the audience excellent viewing experience.”

To enable BBC Earth and BBC First fans to quickly locate their favourite content on LINE TV, the platform has established two new branded zones on its homepage to host the content. The BBC First zone on LINE TV will broadcast seasons one to four of the classic series Sherlock and the one-off special Sherlock: The Abominable Bride; as well as Maigret, known for Rowan Atkinson’s transformative breakthrough; Call the Midwife and Luther, the internationally-renowned British period dramas, as well as other popular British drama series. With more than 1,500 minutes of BBC Earth content on LINE TV, the most extensive BBC Earth catalogue in Taiwan ever, viewers will also be able to watch Frozen Planet, which averaged eight million viewers per episode and returned for its second season last year; Planet Earth, which had more than a million viewers in its first season and no other nature documentary has yet done so, and Blue Planet, the first natural history documentary to fully explore the ocean world in TV history.