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ITV Studios seeking to up US scripted output but the overall business remains weighted towards unscripted. Open to more M&A is the opportunity arises Highlights of Variety interview with ITV Studios CEO Julian Bellamy
• Five shows made by production companies that are part of the ITV Studios stable – “Bodyguard,” “I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here,” “Vera,” “Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway,” and long-running soap “Coronation Street” – were among the top 10 most-watched shows in the U.K. in 2018.
• The list doesn’t include sun-and-fun reality program “Love Island,” which was a breakout hit for ITV2, a smaller network. But that show will be remade in the U.S. for CBS in 2019 after having already gone into Australia, Germany, and Sweden and others.
• “It’s been a terrific year. We are making more hours than we have before,” Bellamy says. “The fruits of a lot of work are beginning to come through.”
• M&A has been a quick and obvious way to bolster output and financials – ITV Studios now has more than 50 production banners under its wing – but Bellamy notes that underlying growth has been running at about 7% annually. As for the deal-making, he pinpoints the £355 million ($450 million) acquisition of Talpa Media in 2015, which brought “The Voice” into the fold, as a key moment.
• “Revenue has grown by something like 80% in the international division in the last couple of years or so, and a lot of it has been because we have brought in new management and we have made investments,” says former BBC, Channel 4 and Discovery exec. “One of the key ones has been Talpa. It has had a halo effect for us.”
• He cites the example of “The Voice” in France. By bringing production in-house, ITV Studios was able to sign “Fort Boyard” producer Franck Firmin-Guion to run the local business. “That gave us additional weight and credibility in the market, and that in and of itself generates more business,” Bellamy says.
• Although ITV Studios now has “a lot of firepower,” Bellamy is open to further acquisitions. “It has got to be the right creative talent, the right cultural fit,” he said. “And we’ve got to get them for the right price.”
• U.S. drama expansion is a key goal, even though “we’ve been quite open about how we’re not pursuing a scale acquisition in scripted in the U.S.,” Bellamy says. Growth is likely to come through fresh deals with well-known talent. ITV Studios has partnered with Marty Adelstein at Tomorrow Studios, which has already yielded TNT and Netflix show “Snowpiercer,” ITV Studios’ biggest and most ambitious drama to date.
• There are also deals with Jason Blum and Blumhouse Television, and with “The Walking Dead” exec producers Circle of Confusion. ITV Studios’ U.S. team is scouting for more opportunities “to partner with more great creative talent,” Bellamy says.
• At home in Britain, the 2019 drama slate includes an adaptation of H.G. Wells’ c
Enders expects a 3% recession in the UK advertising market if the UK leaves the European Union without a trade deal this year.
The warning compares with a prediction of 2.7% growth for the ad market if there is an orderly Brexit, with Enders predicting that to contribute to 1.5% growth in UK GDP for 2019.
Even if a "no deal" Brexit is averted, Enders is predicting the TV ad market to decline by 2.9% this year to £4.98bn. TV spend growth is estimated to be flat for 2018 (up 0.3%), after shrinking by 3.2% in 2017
TV ad revenue would be particularly hit by a "no deal" Brexit, Enders explained, with advertisers either reducing adspend or shifting part of their TV budgets to other media.
Assuming an orderly Brexit, Enders is forecasting pure-play online media spend to grow by 8.3% this year. This is significantly weaker than in previous years, with an estimated 11.6% in 2018 and 15% in 2017.
The report added: "The total advertising figures partly mask the pressure on UK consumers, due to an expansion of the measured advertising spend universe. This is due to significant self-serve online advertising growth by SMEs and non-advertising marketing budgets moving to online advertising platforms."
The issue is all about age.. brands target younger people, who have less money, no mortgages etc, whilst ignoring the over 50's who have the weatlh. Not just in TV but in all media. One of the reasons for this is ageism in the business.. the last thing we need are more young execs.. brands need educating. And BTW in Kelly Williams, ITV has one of the most respected execs in the business.
https://mediatel.co.uk/newsline/2018/12/29/itv-launches-new-consumer-magazine/
I'm surprised the shares haven't dipped under a quid as a result of this.....
recruitment freeze, 250m in savings... yeah WPP are doing brilliantly. Do you know anyone who works at Mediacom, Wavemaker, Essence, Mindshare? I do. they will tell you how it is. 2019 is looking to be a shocker
ITV's fortunes are not based on how one show, or one world cup does. Its all based on the overal share of budgets they take when negotiating with the big media agencies. IACGMOOH has done really well, audience wise, but it wont have any effect on the share price.
Liberty Global CFO rules out big acquisitions as company mulls strategic options (Ovum) Liberty Global will use proceeds from the sale of its German and CEE businesses to Vodafone principally to return cash to investors in the form of buybacks and has no plans for big acquisitions, according to Charlie Bracken, the company's EVP and CFO, speaking at the Morgan Stanley European Media & Technology conference last week. Bracken said that proceeds from the sale could in theory be used to pay down debt, buy back stock, or make acquisitions. However, he said, Liberty is now more or less "strategically complete,"
Last night’s @imacelebrity launched with 11 million /51% (up 750k year on year) making the biggest overnight rating of 2018 outside of World Cup matches. The audience peaked with 11.9 million /51% share