George Lucas,
Kathleen Kennedy and Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong unveiled
Lucasfilm‘s new regional headquarters today in the Southeast Asian city-state. The Sandcrawler building sits on a 22,500 square meter campus, which features a
Yoda fountain, a 100-seat theater and state-of-the-art digital production capabilities, CNBC reported locally. Lucasfilm originally set up shop in Singapore in 2005 to produce digital animated content for film and television, VFX for feature films and multi-platform games. The studio houses the local divisions for Industrial Light & Magic, LucasArts and Lucasfilm Animation. The Sandcrawler will also be Disney and ESPN’s new regional HQ.
According to
The Straits Times, Kennedy said the facility is
working on such films as
Avengers 2,
Jurassic World and
Transformers: Age Of Extinction, among others. She noted, “When we first opened our Singapore studio in 2005, the local digital production landscape looked very different. It was relatively small, with a limited talent pool and virtually no visual effects work being done. By investing in local talent, we’ve been able to significantly grow our Singapore studio into a world-class digital production facility.” (Other digital media companies with a base in the growing hub include Electronic Arts, Double Negative and Ubisoft.) There are about 360 employees now at Lucasfilm Singapore, which also operates the Jedi Masters Program to train aspiring artists. Here’s video of Lucas on why the company is so invested in Singapore: