Banijay Entertainment, the production and distribution behemoth that now encompasses All3Media, is considering an expansion into the highly competitive U.S. scripted space, having gained major financial firepower through the recent merger.
Speaking alongside chair Jeff Sugar in a conversation with Variety’s co-editor-in-chief at Mipcom Cannes, Banijay CEO Marco Bassetti said he saw an opportunity for the company to grow its presence in scripted production, where it’s already active with films and series such as “Hamnet” and “Peaky Blinders.”
“We are pretty much in Europe, Brazil, Mexico, Australia, India and Israel. Let’s see what the future holds in the U.S. as well, because we have never touched this business,” said Bassetti. “We saw some of our competitors go there, not really succeed, and then go back.”
“We need to go there with the right people, the right IP, and we need to invest in the U.S. It’s quite different from the scripted business in Europe,” he continued.
Zucker concurred. “It’s something we will look at in the years ahead. We are incredibly well-capitalized now,” he said. “We have the number one movie on Amazon, number one shows on Netflix and Apple, and new titles coming. I think the scripted strength is already there. And given our new ability together, our new capitalization, I think the U.S. is a new opportunity for us in the scripted space.”
It was only two months ago that Banijay Entertainment and RedBird IMI officially completed the $8 billion merger of Banijay and RedBird IMI’s All3Media, which is headquartered in London, U.K. The deal saw All3Media CEO Jane Turton take on the role of deputy CEO of the combined company, which boasts over 265,000 hours of content and some of television’s most recognizable franchises.
Zucker explained how Banijay had relentlessly pursued the merger with All3Media from a very early stage. Only eight days after RedBird IMI bought All3Media, a little over two years ago, Bassetti phoned Zucker to see if he was willing to consider a merger. This was followed by a visit to New York by Banijay founder and chairman Stephane Courbit when Courbit again suggested a deal to Zucker.
However those discussion were put on hold while Zucker pursued a takeover of ITV Studios “that went on for about six to nine months, and didn’t end up going anywhere,” Zucker explained. Pretty soon after Zucker started talking to Banijay “and that ended up taking another six to nine months, and here we are two years later after we first bought All3Media, and so that’s how this all happened.”
The merger has brought together two of Europe’s largest production groups, with operations spanning scripted and unscripted television, film and distribution, and ultimately gave them a bigger footprint in English-language production.
Bassetti argued that the company’s scale represented an increasingly valuable asset for streamers.
“For the platforms, having a solid company behind a production means knowing that we can deliver the quality on screen that we’re promising,” Bassetti said. “Sometimes, for small and medium-sized companies, that’s difficult. We can go further and do more to make a project successful.”
While the company is best known for its unscripted IP, thanks to “super brands” like “The Traitors,” “Big Brother” and “MasterChef,” Bassetti said the merger also creates opportunities to capitalize on these franchises across the group’s international operations.
“If we’d been together before, we would have had the opportunity to produce ‘The Traitors’ in all our territories and create much more value for that IP within the group,” Bassetti said.
“We’re operating in 25 countries, so when we have an IP, we have the opportunity to produce it in 25 countries. There’s definitely more opportunity in that sense. That’s the beauty of having such a large footprint and such strong production companies around the world,” he said.
Bassetti also pointed to the group’s growing business producing local versions of formats for streaming platforms, including Amazon’s “LOL,” which Banijay produces in around 13 territories, Netflix’s “Physical: 100” in five and “Love Is Blind” in seven or eight.
Although producing shows for hire isn’t necessarily Banijay’s core business, Bassetti said it was another area the group was looking to develop.
Asked about potential M&A opportunities in the U.S., Zucker stressed that “Banijay doesn’t need anything and is open to any great ideas.”
“That’s the beauty of having shareholders who are so well positioned, so well capitalized and so ambitious. We’ll look to be opportunistic and we’ll look to continue to grow,” Zucker said. “But the reality is that we also don’t have to do anything, and there’s no one out there that we feel we have to have.”
Banijay was recently mentioned as one of the European companies eyeing Lionsgate. Neither executive addressed those rumors.
Zucker also raised the prospect of closer ties between Banijay and other businesses in RedBird IMI’s portfolio, which will continue to operate separately.
“We have a lot of companies within our portfolio that are very complementary to what Banijay does. I think you’ll see opportunities for us to work together and come together in different ways over the next few years,” he said.
Asked whether that could involve acquisitions, Zucker said, “Certainly collaboration is easy. And whether there are other opportunities in M&A, everything will be on the table.”
Going forward, Zucker and Bassetti said they will keep building the company as a broader entertainment group rather than just a production banner, with plans to invest in live entertainment, digital and sports.
“Our core business will remain the same: creating new IP and investing in our talent and IP. But we also want to invest in live, digital and sports,” Bassetti said. “That’s our strategy, and we want to keep going in that direction.”
Bassetti said the company’s growing scale and financial resources now put it in a position to compete with some of Hollywood’s major studios.
“I believe that now we can consider ourselves not just a production company, but an entertainment company,” he said. “And I think we can be compared with some of the big European and U.S. studios. Not just companies like Fremantle or Mediawan anymore. I think we have nothing to envy Sony, Lionsgate and the others. And that’s our ambition.”
Source: variety.com
