NATPE Budapest 2016: signs of a growing region

Among the most often-heard perceptions appears the ‘larger number’ of buyers attending the show (compared to last year in Prague), including one unusual report about a buyer complaining about finding ‘few sellers considering the number of buyers present at the convention’.

José Escalante, CEO, Latin Media (USA) explained: ‘It must be understood that nowadays there is a higher competition: more companies and more products’. And Cristobal Ponte, exclusive representative for CEE, Middle East and Africa, from Cisneros Media Distribution (USA) added that the transformation consist in that ‘there are more and more formats to access to the contents’, but that process do not limit the content production. ‘On the contrary, it stimulates it’, concludes.

Most of the distributors remarked that they had this year a slate of appointments that left no spare time. They agreed that the higher attendance level could be attributed, on the one hand, to better economy conditions in the CEE region and, on the other hand, to the efforts by NATPE to attract a higher number of buyers to this show.

Prensario perceived that, especially on Wednesday, the hallway traffic at the first and second floors of the Intercontinental hotel has been particularly intense, with an imposing number of “blue badges” (buyers) crowding the elevators at certain times during the heaviest market hours.

By comparison, the buyers attending the four screening sessions held on Monday and Tuesday, while satisfactory to the studios running these exhibitions cannot be blamed as a reason for light attendance at the View-Box floor and suites. This could happen maybe due to a change in the strategy of many CEE broadcasters that, with different levels of investment, are testing in-house product, as has been explained at the various sessions described in our earlier reports this week. In other words, there could be a sort of disruption provoked by a change in what buyers are seeking, with the supply not evolving at the same pace.

However, other buyers like Jan Rudovský, head of acquisitions at FTV Prima (Czech Republic), considers that ‘acquisitions are still key for our niche channels - Prima Cool, Prima Zoom, female-skewing Prima Love and movie-themed Prima Max - where acquisitions account for 99% of the content’.

The panels organized during the show were turned attractive through the exploration of different aspects of the current TV business and its evolution in the past few years. Several were focused on the production of programming within the region, with one of them dealing with formats, featuring executives from five companies discussing issues such as knowing when a certain format ‘must be dropped’, ‘not thinking about the next big hit’ or, in the case of co-productions, ‘having as few partners as possible’ or ‘admitting independent producers only when they bring something significant to the table’, an opinion not shared by colleagues participating at the same session.

The independent producers had their moment of glory at the pitching contest held on Wednesday, were several of them explained the basics of their initiatives to a jury, fielded the questions from the experts and witnessed how one of them was awarded the opportunity to receive expert advice and thus move a step towards fame and fortune. NATPE MD & COO JP Bommel told Prensario that this type of contest attracts hundreds of participants in the US and is considered an efficient way to promote new talent within the industry.

Other major event during the market was the ink of a cooperation agreement between China International TV Corporation (CITVC) and MTVA (Hungary), held on Tuesday, that invites MTVA to join the Silk Road Television International Cooperation Community, co-creating “China Hour” time slot, and the co-production of an animation character panda and the most representative image of Hungary.