“Mia and me®”, produced by Lucky Punch GmbH – a joint venture between m4e AG and Professor Gerhard Hahn from Hahn Film, has won the 8th annual MipJunior Licensing Challenge. The highly ambitious production “Mia and me®” faced strong competition such as “Justin Time” from Canada or “Let’s Get Inventin’” from New Zealand. For the first time ever a production created and developed in Germany has won this award.

The Licensing Challenge is an international competition for new TV programmes, cosponsored by License Global Magazine, seeking out the hottest kids’ properties with the greatest licensing and merchandising potential. Out of more than 80 entries, License Global Magazine and a panel of judges that included representatives of Mattel, Zinkia Entertainment, Stella Projects, Exim Licensing and Chorion, chose five finalists that were presented in live pitches at the Martinez Hotel in Cannes last Saturday. The properties’ originality, visual and story elements as well as distribution and broadcast plans were also taken into consideration by the judges. Tony Lisanti, global editorial director of License Global, hosted the event.

“Mia and me®” is a unique fantasy adventure, a hybrid of live action and CGI animation and the first brand ever clearly focussing on unicorns. The story begins when 12 year old girl Mia finds herself hurled into the wondrous world of Centopia, a kingdom full of unicorns, elves, pans and dragons. But Centopia is in danger and Mia – now an animated elf - must find the strength within herself to save the unicorns – and an entire world.

The TV-series is currently produced by Lucky Punch GmbH (a joint venture between m4e AG and Gerhard Hahn), in co-production with Rainbow S.r.l. and March Entertainment as well as m4e AG, Hahn Film, ZDF German Television Network and Rai Fiction. The TV-series made its market debut at last year’s Mipcom, after becoming the most requested programme at MipJunior.

The international distribution of rights of “Mia and me®” is via m4e AG as well as through its subsidiary Telescreen B.V. and the co-production partner Rainbow S.r.l.. Production of the 26 episodes of the first season will be completed by the end of 2011, and a second season with 26 further episodes is already in development. “Mia and me®” is expected to celebrate its international TV premiere in spring of 2012.