Taiwanese entrepreneur AlanLin has launched Media Vantage, Taiwan's first venture capital company specialising in the entertainmentand cultural industries.

Lin, president of EmersGroup, has raised $240m over a six-year period towards planned initial capitalof $300m for the fund. While Media Vantage will prioritise television seriesand film projects, general manager Diane Chou, a film industry veteran, notesthat it may also invest in production companies and talent agencies. Investmentis not limited to Taiwan.

At the press conference in Taipei, Cheng Wen-tsan - the newly appointed Minister ofTaiwan's Government Information Office (GIO) - distanced himself from hispredecessor Pasuya Yao's plan to grow the film industry to 100 movies a year.

Instead, Cheng emphasisedthe need for bigger-budgeted feature films and television series, suggesting thatthe government can use existing funds to co-invest with Media Vantage on aproject-by-project basis.

Legislator Justin Chou, aformer news anchorman and spokesman for the KMT opposition party, criticisedthe GIO for "bouncing checks" and breaking recent promises to the film industry.He believes that the introduction of private venture capital is timely and "a goodthing" for local media industries so as to help "bring Taiwan movies to the international stage".

Alan Lin describes MediaVantage as "not a very big fund" at this stage, but believes that other investorswill come on board once it has proven itself profitable. He notes that suchfunds are common elsewhere in Asia, especially in South Korea. Aself-professed lover of movies, he describes his own direction as "verycommercial" and insists that he is "not going to be making films for awardceremonies".