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10 December 2009

week 50

Opportunity and risk Johannes Züll on crisis, new channels and digitisation in

Germany RTL Television secured top matches RTL Radio broadcasts the of the 2010 football world cup 2010 football world cup

United Kingdom Five signs deal with Youtube Alpha reports the best month ever week 50

COVER: Montage with Johannes Züll, CEO of RTL Televizija, and stars of the channel

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“Taking up the challenge” After giving Johannes Züll the customary 100 days to settle in at RTL Televizija, Backstage welcomes him back, asking about Croatia, his strategy for RTL Televizija and the challenges ahead. Johannes Züll Croatia - 10 December 2009

Johannes Züll is no stranger to RTL Group. On 1 September 2009, Johannes Züll took up From 1999 to 2007, Züll held various executive his post as CEO of RTL Televizija, following positions within the company, including Christoph Mainusch who became CEO of Managing Director at RTL Interactive and Head Alpha TV in Greece and a member of the of Strategy and Business Development at RTL Televizija Board of Directors. Backstage RTL Television in Cologne. He also served as seized the opportunity to ask the new CEO Managing Director of the channel N-TV, about the country, his channel and his strategy as Managing Director RTL New Media, Head of for the future. the Internet & New Technologies division at RTL Group in , and as Head of Mr. Züll, your first 100 days as CEO of Business Development for TV in the German- RTL Televizija are over. What’s your first speaking territories, CLT-UFA. Züll also sat on impression of the channel and the country? the supervisory boards of Super RTL and RTL Televizija is very well positioned. We will IP Deutschland. Prior to his career at RTL again finish the year as the all-day and prime- Group, Züll worked for the Boston Consulting time market leader and with the highest Group in and Thailand from 1993 to advertising market share of all competitors. 1999. Even more important, we have excellent programmes in our current line-up and in the coming months. Imagine a station with series like all three CSI franchises, The Mentalist, Bones, Desperate Housewives, Grey’s Anatomy, with deals with Warner, Fox, Universal and Paramount, with news beyond 30 per cent ratings, with Come Dine With Me and Kitchen Nightmares and with strong shows like Idols – that’s RTL Televizija.

Desperate Housewives

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How would you describe Croatia’s TV market and the competitive landscape? The Croatian TV market is very developed and highly competitive. With a public broadcaster that commands a budget of three to four times our budget and a commercial competitor, Nova, which belongs to the CME group, we really have to fight for programming, advertising and eyeballs. Beyond the four national stations, we have to watch the platform operators more and more, especially the major IPTV operator Max-TV from Deutsche Telekom and the major cable operator B Net. Together they “control” around 25 per cent of all TV households.

You used to be CEO of N-TV and RTL Interactive in Germany. What’s different at RTL Televizija and what experiences from these times are useful for you? Of course, the focus and positioning of RTL Televizija is very different from that of N-TV and RTL Interactive. N-TV is a thematic channel, while RTL Televizija is a general- interest channel. RTL Interactive develops the

Jesikova Juha from Kitchen Nightmare interactive activities of the German TV stations, while our interactive activities are integrated I cannot give a first impression of Croatia, as within the station. All three have led the market I’ve only had time to see a bit of . Zagreb in their respective segments; that is what they has a very beautiful city centre with a lot of have in common. And, as I enjoyed working for interesting architecture, people are very friendly N-TV and RTL Interactive, I very much enjoy and there are excellent restaurants. With the working here now. I am trying to take my European Community accession process in full learning from former experiences and bring swing, with the expected date of accession in them in on a daily basis. January 2012, there is a lot going on in politics in Croatia.

How would you rate the economic situation in Croatia at the moment? The financial crisis has hit Croatia very hard, but with a time lag of at least three months compared to Germany, the UK or France, for example. Given this time lag, Croatia seems to need a bit longer to recover from the crisis. Advertising markets have dropped by 20 percent over the course of the year. The last two months of this year fortunately show only single-digit losses in per cent compared to the same period last year. The most important things from an economic perspective at the moment are that: first consumers start spending again, secondly the unemployment rate, which is currently at around 15 per cent, does not increase further and thirdly the exchange rate stays at its current level.

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What are RTL Televizija’s strengths? Where European News Exchange, and we learn from is there room for improvement? the interactive activities of the group. These are Market leadership in audience and advertising just some examples of how RTL Televizija can only be achieved if there is a clear strategy, benefits from the group. a strong management team and excellent programming. RTL Televizija has them all. Is building a family of channels in Croatia These are the ingredients for success. still on the agenda? More than ever, as Croatia is now moving fast Unfortunately, you cannot rest on your laurels, on its way to full digital switch-over. At the but always have to actively work on developing moment, the four national stations cover more your positioning and programming. This is what than 98 per cent of the country with analogue the team does on a daily basis. We are in the terrestrial distribution. By the end of 2010, gratifying position that my predecessor analogue signals will have to be switched off, Christoph Mainusch actively helps us in this replaced by DTT. This switch-over represents process and we can therefore learn from his both an opportunity and a risk for us. The most experience. important question is whether we will be given the chance to start a second channel in the What advantages does RTL Televizija have second multiplex. A public tender is planned to as part of RTL Group? award another four to six national licenses. We Although television is a local business, there are actively working on scoring one of these are a lot of synergies that can be captured licenses. through cooperation within the group. We actively participate in the group’s Synergy Growth in interactive activities is also on the Committees and apply the learnings to our agenda. However, we first need to find the right daily business. We closely cooperate with BCE business model before we start investing in on technical issues, we are a member of such activities.

5 Passionate about music Calogero’s album L’embellie was named the “RTL Album of the year 2009” by RTL Radio’s listeners. The French singer accepted the award from Frédéric Jouve, Director of Entertainment Programmes, and gave a special concert for the listeners of RTL Radio France in front of a live audience at the Grand Studio RTL. week 50 the RTL Group intranet

Prime teams during prime time RTL Television has managed to secure top matches featuring Europe’s top teams for its six broadcasts of preliminary-round matches in the Fifa Football World Cup 2010 in . Germany - 8 December 2009

On the very first day of the World Cup, RTL “Without exception, RTL Television’s six World Television will show the encounter between Cup evenings in the preliminary round promise Uruguay and 2006 World Cup finalist France in top-notch, exciting and crowd-drawing Cape Town. The kick-off for this match – as for matches between great football nations,” says all other preliminary-round matches presented Anke Schäferkordt, CEO of RTL Television. “We exclusively by RTL Television on free-to-air TV are especially pleased with the fact that we will – happens during prime time at 20:30. The be presenting such an attractive match on the channel agreed to this with the Fifa and the two evening of the very first day of this World Cup.“ public broadcasters ARD and ZDF at the RTL’s Head of Sports Manfred Loppe adds: ‘Picking’ in Cape Town last weekend. The “We also expect to see a lot of suspense in the broadcasts of the final rounds – the two Round last preliminary round encounters, since they of 16 games and a quarter-final match to be practically serve as finals on the way to the shown on RTL Television – will be picked after Round of 16.” the end of the preliminary round of the Fifa Football World Cup.

An overview of RTL Television’s preliminary-round broadcasts:

Q Friday, 11 June, 20:30, Cape Town: Uruguay v. France (Group A)

Q Monday, 14 June, 20:30, Cape Town: v. (Group F)

Q Friday, 18 June, 20:30, Cape Town: England v. Algeria (Group C)

Q Monday, 21 June, 20:30, Johannesburg: v. Honduras (Group H)

Q Thursday, 24 June, 20:30, Cape Town: Cameroon v. (Group E)

Q Friday, 25 June, 20:30, Mangaung/Bloemfontein: v. Honduras (Group H)

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The X Factor is coming Music superstars like Leona Lewis were discovered on X Factor. Now Vox and RTL Television are bringing the format to Germany. Germany - 4 December 2009

What makes X Factor so special? Over the course of the show the three judges, experienced music professionals all, become the mentors for individual candidates. They promote their favourites and thus compete with each other within the jury as well. Of course only one vocal act can win a recording contract and go on to a career in music. Who has that certain je-ne-sais-quoi that turns talent into stardom: who has the “X Factor”?

RTL Television will broadcast the kick-off show and the finale. The other episodes will be shown on Vox. Both channels are part of Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland. X Factor is produced by Grundy Light Entertainment, another RTL Group company.

X Factor is currently being enjoyed by audiences in 16 countries – in the UK, the current season is nearing the finale on 13 December. The semi-finals show last Sunday featured Lady Gaga and Janet Jackson as special guests. Leona Lewis, the 2006 winner of X Factor in the UK, already has 16 platinum records to her name and this week appeared as a special guest on the French- Belgian version of the show, which is broadcast by W9 in France and RTL-TVI in .

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A wartime epic The screen adaptation of a dramatic World War II rescue operation marks the first cooperation between the Teamworx and Talkback Thames. Germany / - 7 December 2009

Simon Verhoeven, Ken Duken and Jacob Matschenz play German officers

The wind carries sounds across the water – title), which tells the story of the incident. Much screams, moans, cries for help. German of the footage, which was shot mostly in Cape submarine U-156 has just scored three torpedo Town, South Africa, is already “in the can.” hits on the “Laconia,” a luxury cruise liner turned troop transporter. 600 nautical miles off the coast of West Africa, the ocean is literally churning with distress. No fewer than 2,700 people are fighting for survival in the cold water. Help – at least for some – comes from an unexpected quarter: the enemy himself. The German submarine suddenly surfaces, opens its hatches, brings several hundred people on board in defiance of Hitler’s orders to destroy the enemy, and ends up in great danger itself.

This little-known and somewhat paradoxical act of civil courage, which was in fact kept as somewhat of a dirty secret by all warring parties, actually happened in 1942 exactly as described above, and will soon happen again – on television. The BBC and ARD have commissioned the FremantleMedia subsidiaries Teamworx and Talkback Thames to jointly produce the drama Laconia (working On the set of Laconia 8 week 50 the RTL Group intranet

A few figures illustrate what makes this such an extraordinary co-production: with a production budget of EUR 13 million, the two-part movie is one of the largest and most lavish TV projects ever for the two RTL Group subsidiaries. This is particularly evident in the production sets: for instance, the U-156 submarine of the movie was constructed in South Africa using more than 100 tons of steel – a 70-meter, full-scale and floatable replica of the original. “The interior of the U-Boot was set up in the studio – among other things, this was necessary because we are very dependent on the weather Franka Potente plays a German woman disguised when shooting on location at sea,” explains set as an English citizen designer Knut Loewe. He and the producers promise that the movie will feature “superlative The jumble of languages on the set is quite set and ship constructions the likes of which comparable to the real thing in 1942, as the have never before been seen in German cast is as international as the people involved television.” in the original Laconia incident: German stars like Ken Duken, Thomas Kretschmann and Actor Ken Duken, who plays the German Matthias Koeberlin are on board alongside lieutenant commander Hartenstein in Laconia, Scottish actors Brian Cox and Lindsay Duncan. is delighted with the scale of the German- Franka Potente plays a German woman English film project: “People are often disguised as an English citizen; on board U- condescending about international co- 156, she becomes the liaison between productions, but our set shows that they can Mortimer, an officer on the Laconia, and have great advantages. Europe can easily hold Captain Hartenstein. its own against large American productions. They’re using our material, after all,” he recently The movie, which will air simultaneously on told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. ARD and BBC in 2010 in two 90-minute episodes, is directed by Uwe Janson, who The writing of the screenplay was approached already notched up a major success for with similar conscientiousness. After the Teamworx earlier this year: he directed the TV original go-ahead for the film was given by event Vulkan (Volcano), RTL Television’s Teamworx CEO Nico Hofmann and Talkback biggest fiction production in 2009. Thames CEO back in 2004, author Alan Bleasdale spent several years researching the material, including interviews with a number of contemporary witnesses. The aim was to tell the story without pathos and above all from the perspective of all the nations involved.

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Extending the reach YouTube and Five have signed a major content deal which will make the broadcaster’s original full-length programmes available on-demand and free-of-charge via YouTube in the UK. United Kingdom - 4 December 2009

Programming from Five, such as Neighbours, Home And Away, The Hotel Inspector and The Dawn Airey, Chairman and Chief Executive of Gadget Show, can be found within YouTube’s Five, said: “This is a tremendously important recently announced UK Shows section, which deal for Five because in one fell swoop it brings together more than 3,000 hours of full- extends the reach of our content beyond linear length programming and clips from its TV and our own existing websites to a new professional content partners at audience of younger, upwardly mobile and YouTube.com/shows. The strategic web-savvy individuals – an audience that partnership marks the second time a advertisers are equally desirous of attracting. broadcaster anywhere in the world has made a Importantly it extends the availability of legally comprehensive catch-up schedule available on available long-form content online thereby YouTube. The first such deal, with Britain’s dealing a blow to web piracy.” , was announced in October. Five will also use YouTube as a platform to All programmes will be available only in the UK, engage with fans of some of its biggest shows. free-of-charge and supported by advertising, For instance, in the New Year UK residents will shortly after broadcast in TV. Five will have a be able to audition via YouTube for a guest role branded presence on YouTube and its sales on the popular soap opera Neighbours. team will be able to sell both display and video advertising around the content available on the The deal is non-exclusive, allowing Five to site. YouTube’s Content ID copyright system continue to distribute Demand Five content via allows Five to automatically detect its own websites including unauthorised user uploads that contain Five http://demand.five.tv/ and other third party content and block or monetise these as it sites and services. chooses.

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The radio station of the World Cup RTL Radio, the official radio station of the French team, will also be the official broadcaster for the 2010 World Cup. France - 7 December 2009

On Wednesday 2 December, RTL Radio France signed a radio broadcast contract for the 2010 Fifa World Cup in South Africa. France’s number one radio station will have a special plan of action in place, featuring dedicated programming, broadcasting of the French team’s matches from 11 June to 11 July and the top players in world football.

RTL Radio’s plan for covering the events, which will be organised by the sports department and its special correspondents, will be enhanced by analyses and commentary by the station’s consultant Bixente Lizarazu, who in 1998 took home the World Cup for France, making a dream come true for an entire nation.

Bixente Lizarazu

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Best month ever Alpha TV in Greece continues on its dynamic course, improving its performance compared to October and year on year. Lakis Lazopoulos Greece- 4 December 2009

Alpha TV achieved an audience share of Alpha’s strongest week days in prime time, 15.8 per cent among viewers aged 15 to 44 in among viewers aged 15 to 44, are Tuesday with November. This represents an increase of Lakis Lazopoulos who achieved a total 4 percentage points compared to November audience share of 51.6 per cent, Wednesday 2008. Compared to October 2009, all-day with the popular new programmes Agrotis audience shares increased by 0.6 percentage monos psahni (The Farmer Wants a Wife) points. In prime time Alpha TV doubled its attracting 26.4 per cent of viewers aged 15 to audience shares compared to November 2008, 44 and Gia Logariasmo Sas (Get Out Of Debt) recording its best month ever with a 19.5 per drawing 20.6 per cent of 15 to 44 year-olds, cent share of audiences aged 15 to 44 – an and Thursday with the staggering stories increase of 9.8 percentage points. Compared featured on Pame Paketo and Kitchen to October, prime-time audience shares Nightmares!. increased by 5.4 per cent or 1 percentage point. “Our continuous growth is the result of a sharper profile and positioning of Alpha TV In November, the shows Kafes me tin Eleni during the last weeks and months. Creating (Coffee with Eleni) and Kati Psinetai (Come Dine new programme trends and reliability in With Me) marked significant progress programming has lead to a higher level of our compared with the previous month. While viewers’ loyalty towards the channel”, says Kafes me tin Eleni attracted 25.4 per cent of Christoph Mainusch, CEO of Alpha. “This is the total audience in November – an increase of 2.1 fundament for a sustainable performance in percentage points over October – Kati Psinetai 2010.” scored 28.4 per cent of the total audience, increasing its share by 5.4 percentage points compared to October.

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Interact while watching Antena 3 has enhanced its Antena 3.0 strategy with the launch of a new video player at Antena3.com. The new site lets Internet users watch shows like El Internado and interact with friends via Windows Live Messenger without leaving the video channel. Spain - 4 December 2009

Does your relationship lead you to despair? Domestic disputes aren’t always bad – in any case they’re bringing M6 excellent audience ratings, as Scenes de Menages attaines more than 2 million viewers regulary France - 7 December 2009

The best of TV, unlimited RTL à l’infini, RTL Belgium’s video-on-demand platform, has just fine-tuned its new subscription for unlimited viewing of a selection of the best programmes from RTL- TVI, Club RTL and Plug RTL. Belgium - 7 December 2009

Teamworx and Bild.de present a new Web sit-com The new online comedy Rauf und Runter (Up And Down) made its debut on Bild.de at the beginning of the week. Germany - 8 December 2009

Fancy a last-minute Christmas shopping spree in ? Radio 538 again organises a weekend shopping trip to London for 82 of its listeners. Netherlands - 8 December 2009

Comedy as a new feature in the programming RTL II systematically continues its brand positioning strategy and will be establishing comedy as a new genre in its programming from January 2010. Germany - 9 December 2009 13 week 50 the RTL Group intranet

New features and a new look Following last week’s relaunch of RTL.de, RTL’s new mobile portal now offers even more topics and videos too at Mobil..de, all in a fresh new layout and with a new, revised structure. Germany - 9 December 2009

Pulling together to promote high-definition TV RTL Television and Sony Deutschland present a lavish trailer campaign showcasing the fascination of high definition television (HDTV). Germany - 9 December 2009

Wer wird Millionär? app scores The new Wer wird Millionär? app for iPhone and iPod touch is flying off the virtual shelves at the German App Store: with a record 250,000 downloads in under ten days, the media brand’s debut as an app went exceedingly well. Germany - 10 December 2009

Major developments for Merlin FremantleMedia Enterprises announced the commission of series three from BBC One and the appointment of Getretro as UK toy figurine licensee. United Kingdom - 10 December 2009

Great series and movies In early December, Maxdome acquired the rights to Verbotene Liebe and other popular series from UFA. This makes it the first provider to show an ARD series immediately after its TV broadcast. UFA also plans to make available films from its library of rights. Germany - 10 December 2009

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People

Ute Biernat Ute Biernat Germany - 8 December 2009

Ute Biernat, Managing Director of Ute Biernat has served as Managing Director of FremantleMedia’s German subsidiary Grundy Grundy Light Entertainment since 2000. The Light Entertainment, has been appointed to production firm is part of FremantleMedia, represent RTL Group on the “ which in turn is part of the German UFA group, Management Representative Committee” and produces some of the most popular (BMRC). She succeeds Axel Duroux, former entertainment shows on German television, head of RTL Radio in France, who left the including Deutschland sucht den Superstar company in June 2009, and will serve (Idols) and () for RTL alongside Romain Mannelli, RTL Group Television. Since 2005, Ute Biernat has also Executive Vice President Corporate HR, who served as Chairwoman of the Format has represented the Bertelsmann group’s Recognition and Protection Association largest corporate division on the committee (Frapa), a syndicate of around 100 TV since 2006. production firms from more than 30 countries who work to strengthen the protection of “I am delighted that Ute Biernat, a woman from formats. our ranks who is as experienced as she is self- confident, was appointed to sit on Bertelsmann’s international management representative committee,” declares RTL Group CEO Gerhard Zeiler.

For over 35 years, the BMRC has represented the interests of Bertelsmann’s executives across all corporate divisions and countries. The international committee is chaired by Ian Hudson, Deputy CEO of UK Ltd, and his deputy Andreas Kohn, Vice President of Services. “The BMRC advises the Executive Board in its work, questions resolutions and measures adopted, represents the concerns of executives worldwide and provides a competent discussion forum for talking about larger topics,” said Krohn in an interview with BeNet, Bertelsmann’s intranet, describing the BMRC’s tasks.

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People Daniela Matei Eastern Europe - 10 December 2009

FremantleMedia has appointed Daniela Matei to new CEO, Nordic, Eastern Europe and The Balkans, FremantleMedia.

In this newly created role, Daniela will oversee all FremantleMedia’s development and production operations in countries in the Nordic, Eastern European and Balkan regions. This includes FremantleMedia’s production businesses in , , , and Croatia, and existing format licensing operations in , , and . Daniela will commence

Daniela Matei in the role from 1 February 2010 and will report directly to Simon Spalding, Regional CEO, Europe and Asia Pacific for FremantleMedia.

Daniela has more than 18 years of international experience in the media industry and related areas, most recently as Senior Vice President, Production and Development at the ProSiebenSat1 Group. Daniela was previously the Vice President – Production for SBS Broadcasting, which was acquired by ProSiebenSat1. Prior to this, she was the President and CEO of Creative Vision International, a production company she helped to create in Bucharest, , where she engineered multi-territory representation and co-production deals, executive produced over 600 hours of prime time programming and also worked on acquisition activities in association with Central-Eastern European broadcasters.

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