Swedish animation outfit Happy Life is teaming up with Germany's EM.TV and Irish production company Magma to produce a full-length animated feature based on popular Swedish children's character Tosh.

The feature, titled The World Of Tosh, will be supported by a 26-episode animated TV series. Pre-production on the project has already started, although as yet there is no director signed up. The first episodes of the TV series will be finished in September 2001 and the series completed by March 2002.

Tosh, or Sune as he is known in Sweden, was created by Soren Olsson and Anders Jacobsson and has so far featured in 16 books. The character has already been the subject of a live-action feature and TV series along with spin-offs such as CD-Roms and games.

Happy Life, well-known for animated TV series such as Pettson And Findus, aims to stick to the basic qualities of the books, which have sold 1.2 million copies domestically.