Special Report – BUYERS
What do kids’ buyers want?
Gérald-Brice Viret, General Director of Signals and Programs of the CANAL + Group (France), Jo Allen, Producer at BBC – Children’s Acquisitions and Animation (UK), and Luca Milano, Director of Rai Kids (Italy)
Prensario interviewed top buyers from around the world for this special report about What do kids’ buyers want? Acquisitions, programming and production executive from Europe, the Americas and APAC highlighting their programming needs, productions in their pipelines and the future of the business.
EUROPE
The Walt Disney EMEA (UK)
We work with independent studios and producers throughout the region for our global screens, including Disney Junior, Disney Channel and Disney +. Our current approach to development includes original series for preschool-age children, school-age children, and a broader family audience, including adults. We seek a compelling storytelling that reflects Disney’s core values of optimism, decency and community with a unique perspective, strong characters, best-in-class creative talent and premium production values’.
CBBC (UK)
The BBC channel, dedicated to children aged 6 to 12, editorial strategy is based on delivering brilliant content to UK children. We are a multi-genre unit, commissioning and sourcing bold and ambitious content for our portfolio of branded platforms. We want all children to see their lives reflected, and we pride ourselves on our role in providing opportunities for new talent both on and off screen. Our goal is to model good behaviors, show kindness and active citizenship, be aspirational and informative, and we believe that children have the right to be carefree and laugh too.
Our programming search is oriented to animation for a target audience of 7 to 12 years old and of the type: Fast-paced comedy, driven by strong and diverse characters, in 11-minute format and of basic viewing for children ages 7 to 9; o clearly 22-minute family comedies; or animation with a more complex narrative style, and with a story arc, possibly anime style, and suitable for younger viewers.
Canal+ Group (France)
Our priority is to renew the strong, distinctive content of our channels, which are highly appreciated by our young audience. We bring titles like Mush-Ush & Les Champotes that participated in more than 30 festivals and broadcast in almost 150 countries, it has established itself as one of the hits of the year, and we are already waiting for S2.
Our editorial strategy pursues an innovative offer through existing formats and genres, but they also ensured the creation of novel and distinctive programs that encourages creativity while remaining faithful to children and their everyday problems. We are looking for animated series, TV specials / movies, and fiction series for children ages 3 to 6 and ages 6 to 10 and over.
Dr Hendy Lim, Director of Content Business at Indonesia Entertainment Group (IEG), Luiz Filipe Figueira, Head of Programming & Content Strategy at Globo (Brazil), Qing Fan, producer, Tencent Video (China)
Ketnet (Belgium)
As the public broadcaster in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium targeting 0-12 years old kids, we classified our network as a 360° screen for children. Our approach encompasses a dedicated linear TV channel, children’s blocks on one of VRT’s main channels, various apps, a website and more than 130 live events a year. The key elements of the digital strategy are innovation, participation, interaction, play, observation and listening.
Regarding purchase intentions, we acquire and co-produce innovative and refreshing programs that match our values: connecting, stimulating, fascinating, positive, relaxing, daring, attractive. 90% of the content is produced locally and 10% is acquired, while animation in co-production with us requires the participation of a Dutch animation studio.
Rai (Italy)
Our strategy has always been to combine entertainment and education in our offer for children with Rai Yoyo, the Italian leading children’s TV channel for preschoolers, and Rai Gulp, for children from 8 to 14 years old. Our own production, mostly carried out in the RAI studios in Turin, is increasingly important, especially during these times, but most of our offer is made up of animation and children’s drama, co-produced or acquired by independent producers.
In our digital ecosystem, TV is integrated to the general RaiPlay VOD platform and the free RaiPlay Yoyo VOD service. Animation and children’s drama are the genres they use the most, and we are also interested in children’s documentaries.
FILM.UA (Ukraine)
Ukraine is a strategic hub to develop animated IPs for the global market, and this is our case with globally acclaimed films such s The Stolen Princess, preschool series Brave Bunnies with strong ratings all around, as well as in-production projects like Hrafn Academy and Roxelana, and an upcoming animated film Mavka. The Forest Song that’s already looking strong with many pre-releases licensing deals.
We are co-developing it with Iceland’s GunHil (Sagafilm) and it has been picked up by Cartoon Forum. We also work in all kinds of formats, both 2D and 3D, feature-length and episodic’, reports Iryna Kostyuk, producer. Our current feature film slate consists of three titles with a common vision. They are based on strong female characters with authentic historical and ethnic backgrounds: for example, The Stolen Princess, with which we have more than 100 territories covered: it was theatrically released on around 4500 Chinese screens, in India in four languages, and a huge success in Europe (Romania, etc.). We have even exceeded big global titles like Coco or Baby Boss in terms of box office numbers, and were the first Ukrainian animated feature film in Latin America ever.
Iryna Kostyuk, producer at FILM.UA Group (Ukraine), Telidja Klaï, Program manager Acquisitions & Coproductions Animation at Ketnet/VRT (Belgium), Orion Ross, VP Animation Digital & Acquisitions EMEA, The Walt Disney Company (UK) and Nathalie Chamberland, director of youth programming at CBC (Canada)
APAC
Tencent (China)
We are looking for animation to buy and/or coproduce for girls ages 7-9. We target series that can complement Tencent Video’s traditional princess or magic-themed shows. The channel for the children’s segment is aimed at children from 0-14 years old. Building on the initial success of the iconic action-adventure series Power Rangers, which we acquired in 2019, we also seek for more live action for tweens and teens +14 years old. Fantasy / science fiction is a genre of choice due to its growing popularity around the world.
As for animated comedies for children under the age of six, we are considering more non-dialogue comedy shows because humor in conversation-based series is often lost in translation for younger viewers, according to the executive. The more universal comedies without dialogue also diminish the need to adjust stories in China to cultural differences.
EMTEK Group (Indonesia)
Our purpose is consistently look for good quality kids’ content, as we will be launching soon a new free-to-air channel 100% dedicated to kids. We see huge demands for that content, which has not been catered to by our current FTA channels, SCTV and Indosiar.
On the Pay TV space, our dedicated channel Horee! has been performing consistently well since its launch, and it’s one of, if not the most popular channel for the grassroots audience. This makes us confident in our venture for a free-to-air channel for kids.
AMERICAS
CBC (Canada)
We are looking for co-creators that CBC can help close any funding gap. Releases should take into account the fact that, as a government-funded body focused on advancing Canadian culture, most projects on CBC’s list should have a strong local angle, such as IPs made here, a strong connection in content, or a specific Canadian angle, like shows literally set in the country, like Anne with an E. A big goal in the coming year is to show Canada to its audience as well. As a result, we are looking for unique and cool shows that highlight different cultures and regions across the country.
Gloob/Gloobinho (Brazil)
We operate two strong brands with a large audience in Brazil. Gloob resumed production this 2021 including D. P. A. (S15), Bugados (S3) and Escola de Gênios, among others. Our editorial strategy is focused on brand-oriented live-action and animated programs that will potentially resonate with children ages 2-5 (Gloobinho) and 6-9 (Gloob).
We are looking for character-driven adventure series projects that we can tackle at an early stage to help jointly fund and develop a new international blockbuster, with potential for L&M and Consumer Products.
