About Vertical Observer
Vertical Observer is an independent record of the vertical-drama industry — the short, phone-native, serialised drama format that grew out of Chinese duanju and now runs as a global app business. It covers the platforms, their economics, the capital moving into the category, the regulation forming around it, and what is actually known about the audience.
The category moves quickly, most of its operators are private, its largest market reports in Chinese, and figures from vendors measuring different things are quoted interchangeably. This site keeps a dated, attributed record of it.
How figures are labelled
Figures carry the basis they rest on wherever the record names one, because in this category the basis is often the whole story:
- official
- From a regulatory filing, a government body, a court, or an industry association. The strongest class of evidence here — and the rarest, because most operators are private.
- estimate
- A third-party research vendor's measurement or projection. The vendor is named wherever the source identifies it, because vendors measure different quantities by different methods and their figures frequently disagree.
- company
- Disclosed by a company about itself and not independently confirmed. Carried because it is on the record, not because it is verified.
- reported
- Reported by a named news outlet, and traceable to neither a filing, a research vendor, nor the company itself. Common in this category, where deal terms and private valuations reach the press before they reach a document.
Method
Sources are surveyed daily: regulatory publications and filings, vendor research, company disclosures, and the trade press in English, German and Chinese. Material is dated to the original release rather than to a later pickup — a national newspaper writing up a vendor report in September does not make it a September figure.
Reports and company profiles list the sources they were compiled from wherever the record names them, and a company figure with no stated basis is marked as such rather than given one. Where two credible sources disagree, both are shown. Where the evidence stops, the page says so rather than closing the gap by inference.
What this site does not do
It carries no advertising and no sponsored placement, and it does not give investment, legal or commercial advice. It reports what is known and says who says so.
Who publishes it
Vertical Observer is published by Colibri Holdings Ltd and built by Tobias Jaeger. It takes no money from the companies it covers and has no commercial relationship with any of them.
Colibri Holdings Ltd is registered in England and Wales, company number 09741137, at 71 Queen Victoria Street, London EC4V 4BE, United Kingdom. Editorial questions and corrections: corrections@verticalobserver.com. Privacy: privacy@verticalobserver.com.
Corrections
Errors are corrected on the record rather than quietly amended: each correction is noted on the page it changes and listed on the corrections page. If you find one — a mis-stated figure, a wrong attribution, a company profile that has gone out of date — please write to corrections@verticalobserver.com.
Copyright
Headlines, quotations and figures remain the property of their publishers and are cited with their source, linked where the source is online. This site is a reference and index, not a republishing service.