C NTENT 5-18 March 2018 www.contentasia.tv l www.contentasiasummit.com Discovery-Scripps Hyper-local boost for Asia streamers wed on Wed New MCA-TV4 Entertainment venture kicks off in Asia Exec exits likely as Perrette integrates teams At some point this week (we’re hearing Wednesday morning Asia time), Discov- ery’s acquisition of Scripps will be a done deal, and questions will start being an- swered, beginning with: Who’s in charge of the blended family in Asia? What will the integration do to headcount in the region? Which brands will survive the kill-or-keep game? And what Scripps’ high-octane Asia head, Leena Singara- jah, chooses to do next? A likely option for now is to keep the structure put in place when Discovery Asia-Pacific president/MD, Arthur Bastings, exited, with no overall Asia-Pacific MD and country/region bosses reporting into international president/CEO, J.B. Perrette. This throws the spotlight onto Singa- rajah, who has given no indication of whether she’s moving into Discovery’s Singapore offices. Or not. There’s also no clear sense of who TV4 Entertainment original, Mothers & Daughters, starring Sharon Stone and Susan Sarandon among Discovery or Scripps staffers has a clear run at keeping their jobs, or whether Perrette will bring in new people entirely as LA-based TV4 Entertainment is expanding team, under Creevey as MD. he attempts to resurrect the Asia business. into Asia Pacific in an exclusive alliance Creevey has long beat a drum in the Together, Discovery/Scripps in Asia have with Gregg Creevey’s Multi Channels TV/video space for speciality content, about 200-220 people, with widespread Asia (MCA) to develop the next genera- and, as consumers continue to migrate role duplication. Top jobs at Discovery as tion of hyper-targeted niche channels in to mobile/online platforms, says the ap- of today include Karan Baja in India/South the region. petite is rising rapidly for thematic con- Asia; Jay Trinidad for North Asia/Japan; The partnership, Omni Channels Asia, tent and rich niche verticals among tel- Shavkat Berdiev for Southeast Asia (where will localise TV4 Entertainment’s original cos, OTT platforms and others seeking to Scripps has the majority of its staff); and content and portfolio of speciality chan- tap specialist audiences. Fang Chang for Greater China. Scripps is nels, acquire home-grown content and Creevey remains committed to a B2B way leaner, with its biggest presence in develop Asia originals with local partners. model. “We have no interest in going di- Singapore, no bodies on the ground in In- TV4 Entertainment currently operates rect to customers,” Creevey says. dia or China, and a smattering of people 30 specialty targeted brands, plans to Creevey describes the evolution of elsewhere. grow this to 100 by 2020, and is produc- niche channels as “niche of niche”. A close watch is also being kept on ing 200 hours of original content a year. “These have a much stronger future looming linear channel renewals/affiliate Channels on the B2B OTT platform in than being a generic channel. As we revenues – still the backbone of the busi- Asia includes Motorland (cars, motor- have seen online and in the digital world, ness – and how an integrated team will cycles); Screambox (horror); Inside Out people are willing to pay a premium for try to change a conversation that hasn’t (home and garden); along with sports something that is in tune with their inter- gone so well for Discovery lately. and food. ests and passions,” he says. The Singapore-based joint venture is More on page 6 led by the existing MCA management The full story is at www.contentasia.tv C NTENTASIA 5-18 March 2018 Page 2. HITS Movies goes live KIRI Rewind pushes ahead with film plans FROM MULTI-AWARD WINNING WRITER JACK THORNE drama that captivates from talent that resonates City Slickers Avi Himatsinghani’s Rewind Networks premieres a week- end movie strand on Saturday, 17 March, expanding the original “best of…” content concept for the first time since the network launched in 2013. The HITS Movies Presents strand, with six slots (3pm, 8pm and 10pm) over Saturday and Sunday, goes live with comedy City Slickers, starring Billy Crystal, Daniel Stern, Bruno Kirby and Jack Palance. City Slickers will be followed by The Amityville Horror, The Good, The Bad and the Ugly and Pink Panther. The addition of movies to the series schedule is a precur- sor to a full HITS Movies channel that Rewind plans to roll out later this year. The full HITS Movies channel will carry titles from all major Hollywood Studios. “We are doing nothing different,” Himatsinghani says, still firm in his conviction that there’s demand for curated MIPTV Stand No: P3.C10 content with a clear proposition. “We are looking at need gaps,” he adds. @all3media_int “We did that with HITS when we put the best TV series of all3mediainternational.com all time in one place. We realised early on that there was a similar gap for special curation of the best Hollywood movies of the past four decades for basic tier subscription audiences,” he says. HITS Movies features films from the 1960s to 1990s. Mov- ies that make the cut are blockbusters of their times, says Rewind Networks’ programming head Sandie Lee. 5-18 March 2018 page 2. C NTENTASIA 5-18 March 2018 Page 3. Sim exits ONE for A+E Asia joins History of Football event Bundesliga APAC role New digital studio layers Asia short-form on global titles Former Multi Channels Asia (MCA)/ONE Championship exec, Kevin Sim, has taken a new role as head of APAC for German football league, Bundesliga, from 15 April 2018. Sim replaces Peter Leible, who takes over as head of the league’s global audiovisual rights from 1 August 2018 after six years in the Asia office. Leible shifts to Frankfurt for the new role. Sim was most recently the director of global media rights at ONE Championship. 25 March premiere for Nicholas Tse cook-off against David Rocco FOX premieres original food series, Ce- lebrity Chef: East vs West, on 25 March, Spanish footballer David Villa is the voice of A+E Networks’ global football event pitting Hong Kong celebrity Nicholas Tse against Canadian chef David A+E Networks Asia joins the rest of the His- Titles include five-part one-hour series, Rocco. The five-part series, announced tory community around the world on 28 History’s Greatest Moments in Football, in April last year, airs on Fox Life, FOX+, May for a 14-day stunt ahead of the 2018 featuring, among others, Pele, Pavarotti, Nat Geo People and Tencent in China. World Cup. The Southeast Asia special Gazza and Maradona; Zig Zag Produc- The pair travelled to five cities in the re- will run for eight days, to 4 June. Japan tions’ five-part, one-hourFootball Godfa- gion for the series, competing against and South Korea will run the full event to thers, which focuses on club managers; each other on local recipes chosen by 10 June. and Goalhanger Films’ five-part half-hour a chef in each place. The History of Football, announced in series, Football’s Greatest: Head to Head, January this year, involves about 40 hours which compares past legends with to- Blue Ant Media picks up of programming. The on-air line up in day’s heroes and asks ‘who is the great- Aus Geographic mag some parts of the world will be a mix of est of them all’. global and local content as well as long- Shorts include The Scout, with Piet De and short-form productions. Visser talking about secrets behind find- Blue Ant Media has bought Austral- Asia’s contribution comes out of Ja- ing global superstars; The Superfan, ian Geographic bi-monthly magazine pan, where the network is co-producing about Spanish fan Manuel Caceres Arte- and related assets from Bauer Media, a one-off 60-minute show, The History of sero, aka Manolo el del bombo; The Ref- the publishers of magazines such as Japanese Football. eree, about English ref, Jawahir Jewels, The Australian Women’s Weekly and The Southeast Asia effort revolves the 23-year-old who is the only FA-quali- Australian House & Garden. Australian around short-form programming out of fied female ethnic Muslim official current- Geographic has 40,000 subscribers, the Singapore-based digital studio an- ly working in the game; and The Prodigy, newsstand sales and a readership of nounced last month. Details of the Asia about four-year-old prodigy Marco An- 540,000. The publishing operation will originals have not yet been disclosed. tonio, whose intestinal problems require be run out of Blue Ant-owned produc- History’s linear broadcast schedule for medical expertise not available in Brazil. tion house Northern Pictures’ Sydney the week is dominated by the global The special is supported by World Cup office. football shows. winner David Villa. @contentasia /contentasia contentasia.tv /company/contentasia 5-18 March 2018 page 4. C NTENTASIA 5-18 March 2018 Page 5. Celestial Tiger reworks Turner takes Tuzki to Paris runways KIX Monday nights Fashion deal with Indian designer for China rabbit Celestial Tiger Entertainment adds a weekly Asian combat sports belt to action entertainment channel KIX’s schedule from 10pm tonight. The new belt features mixed martial arts (MMA) Muay Thai tournament TopKing World Series and championship fight events, includ- ing new Muay Thai tournament, TopKing World Series, Korean MMA promotion Road Fighting Championship, and Chi- na’s Kunlun Fight MMA. 9-1-1 hits 100 Indian designer Manish Arora and Turner China’s creative director HoiTo Lee Twentieth Century Fox Television Distri- Indian fashion designer Manish Arora bution has sold FOX procedural drama put Turner’s favourite rabbit, Tuzki, on the 9-1-1 to more than 100 countries, runway during Paris Fashion Week, which including Japan, South Korea, India ends tomorrow (6 March) in a Fall-Winter and the Philippines.