Distribution in Focus: TVF’s Sam Joyce and Daniyal Bari

With buyers flocking to London TV Screenings and Mip London this week, Broadcast International speaks to TVF International’s senior acquisitions manager Sam Joyce and Daniyal Bari, senior sales manager, about the shifting event cycle, buying habits and the maturing AVOD market.

Sam Joyce (SJ): The distribution sector is competitive, fast-paced, and demands agility. Distributors are becoming more and more important when piecing together production financing, as commissioning budgets shrink and linear advertising revenue continues to decline. Distributors are now vital for most ambitious projects’ finance plans, either by raising funds from across multiple territories, or investing themselves.

With that in mind, the top end of the market is competitive. With fewer projects getting the greenlight, the most in-demand projects create major buzz, which is exciting for distributors. Overall, however, our pipeline continues to consolidate at a pace. Where the industry has seen a commissioning downturn in the US and the UK, TVF’s slate represents a truly international range of producers from across Asia, Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, where demand for high-quality factual programming is only increasing.

Daniyal Bari (DB): One of the biggest challenges facing the global distribution industry this year is the changing market landscape. MIPCOM and MIPTV used to be the North and South Poles of the distribution industry, but with the move to MIP London and increased focus on the London Screenings, it is somewhat unclear how the year will play out.

SJ: Maintaining strong and varied pipelines of premium, ‘must-have’ programming in the face of sustained commissioning slow-downs in major markets like the US and UK will be key to success in the global distribution sector over the next 12 months.

SJ: We are more involved in early-stage projects than ever, offering an exciting opportunity to be in closer collaboration with major production partners, buyers and commissioners. Distributors are consolidating their position as industry leaders, meaning we are better placed than ever to help drive forward production for projects we believe in, and ultimately get them seen around the world. The continuing maturation of the AVOD marketplace also presents interesting opportunities, where distributors can help producers generate revenue from back catalogues, and extend the lives of their programmes.

DB: Distributors are uniquely placed at the centre of the global broadcast landscape, and have an in depth understanding of the topics, themes and modes of storytelling that resonate across different territories. Getting involved in projects from an earlier stage allows us to help shape projects for international audiences. A great example is our world affairs documentary, Arming the Arctic (1 x 52), commissioned by TVF and RTL Germany, which explores urgent and rising geopolitical tensions in the Arctic. We were involved from treatment stage and invested in the project both financially and editorially, and in just a few months it has sold to 20+ territories.

SJ: The subject of ‘acquimissions’ is becoming more and more standard vernacular amongst acquisitions executives and commissioners, where buyers won’t come in at the same level as a commissioner but will offer an elevated acquisition fee to secure a programme, and make a dent in the finance plan.

DB: We benefit from having a large sales team who take a granular approach to international sales. We have four people working across Asia, four in Europe, and more across North America, the UK and Australia and New Zealand. Territories like the Middle East, Central & Eastern Europe and APAC are rife with potential, and our sales team’s territory-by-territory approach means that no stone is left unturned. We’re looking forward to being able to collaborate with our broadcast partners in these territories to bring incredible factual programming to viewers all over the globe. Last year, we did our first deal in Mongolia and we will continue to expand our truly global footprint this year and beyond. This expansive territory footprint also means our knowledge of what is working in the international market is extremely strong, which will help us to get early-stage, premium projects off the ground.