ATF 2015: original, short and digital content

Companies consulted agree that their agendas are pretty tight with meetings back to back. The market floor seems to have more exhibitors and pavilions, and there are more digital buyers in comparison with previous years. There are still no official figures about participants, but Reed Exhibitions believes they will be similar to the last year edition, when the event reached 5,000 participants, an increase of 9% compared to 2013.

Traditionally, ATF is the most effective trade show in Asia Pacific. Why? For sellers, it gathers acquisitions and programming executives from all region in one place. The buyers have access to key distributors including all the Hollywood Studios (they have separated suites instead of booths in the same market floor) and top European players.

Year to year, Prensario notices an increasing number of exhibitors from Asia Pacific, which are now more professionalized and technically prepared to produce high quality original content with global appeal. There are new exhibitors from Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, Japan, among others.

Market trends? Yesterday, DJ Lee, president, media content business, CJ E&M (Korea) presented the first keynote of the day, moderated by Sang-Im Kim, senior director, business operations, Sony Pictures Television Networks Asia, and followed by René Rechtman, head international, Maker Studios (USA), which gathers 60,000 independent producers in the largest YouTube content network.

They all agree that the big trends in Asia Pacific are original, short form and digital content. Digital & Pay TV platforms are not alone on these: broadcasters are going forward slower, but in some cases deeper, and they have one big advantage: they own the rights of the main contents.

About this topic was the third panel of the day, Asia: The Big Picture – The Future of TV and Visual Entertainment. Free TV channels in Asia are adapting their (traditional) business to tackle new audiences. In developed markets, such us the United States, the millennials are choosing new ways of entertainment. The same is occurring in South Korea, Japan and China.

There are ever-evolving consumption patterns and content technologies push new possibilities for digital producers and platforms. Sohu and Youku Todou are producing original content in China and looking for international co-producers, due to the new Government policies that have limited foreign programming exposure. ‘We are now more focused on drama series, as we realized that internet-based model is unlimited’, explained Maggie Xiong, senior director, international acquisitions, Youku Todou.

LeTV (Hong Kong) is rapidly expanding in Asia Pacific: it has just opened offices in China and India and expects to offer own VOD services, apps and original content in those markets, plus USA. Charlene Lai, senior director, content acquisitions and licensing, APAC, says: ‘We have 100k episodes of drama series and 5,000 films, apart from sport programming and documentaries. But, what differentiates us from competitors is entertainment’.

Both executives shared the panel What do Asian buyers want, along with Hwang Jin Woo, general manager/head, formats, media content business, CJ E&M (Korea), who looks for ‘fresh and unique’ formats with his own bible: ancillary business potential, good return of investment and, of course, they must be friendly. Fera Rosihan, director, GroupM Entertainment (Indonesia) remarked that in his country the new thing are Indian, Turkish and Middle East dramas series.

FINAS (Malaysia) presents at ATF its Co-Production Fund, designed to provide financial assistance to content projects. Also, it reintroduced Film in Malaysia Incentive (FIMI) that offers 30% cash rebate on Qualifying Malaysian Production Expenditure (QMPE). ‘The continued success of the incentive is projected to grow Malaysian creative content industry up to 30%’, highlights Dato Kamil Othman, general director of the entity.

Fabricio Ferrara, from Singapore