Worldwide spending on French TV rocketed by 38.8% final yr to €678M, with an enormous enhance in studios profiting from the nation’s tax rebate, in response to Unifrance’s annual French TV Export report delivered on the physique’s Biarritz Rendez-Vous this afternoon.
Funding in tasks that used the Tax Rebate for Worldwide Manufacturing (TRIP) more-than doubled to €302.7M (the euro and greenback are just about equal at current), whereas gross sales and pre-financing of French reveals rose by 6% to €375.9M. In years passed by, this latter determine has tended to be far increased than the TRIP quantity.
The file figures have been reflective of a yr through which issues began returning to regular following the injury inflicted by the Covid pandemic, whereas demonstrating a French TV artistic neighborhood in impolite well being.
Overseas pre-sales in French content material crossed the €100M mark for the primary time, one other file, whereas pre-sales of drama rose sharply to €45.5M and international contribution to co-productions hit its highest quantity for 20 years.
The likes of TF1/RTS 1’s Excessive Mental Potential and Canal+’s Paris Police 1900 have been flagged as success tales.
“The figures present French manufacturing is engaging for all genres and we will be pleased with it,” mentioned Emmanuelle Jouanole, the President of SEDPA, France’s union of TV distribution corporations.
Delivering the figures in a press convention previously hour, Jouanole mentioned they’re testomony to main modifications in purchaser exercise, with extra streamers taking worldwide rights to reveals.
“These platforms actually do breath life into this market,” she added. “Transferring rights worldwide has large worldwide scope and tends to have a robust impression on distribution. We’re working increasingly more upstream, which is nice for producers and good for distributors.”
And the main U.S. studios’ transfer to convey content material again to their very own platforms gifted an extra alternative for French distributors to promote French reveals overseas, in response to Unifrance Director of Audiovisual Sarah Hemar. “Patrons are seeing that what works properly in France, works overseas,” she added.
Round 1.5% of reveals within the streamer’s again catalogues have been French in 2021, in response to the report.
Pure gross sales of French TV reveals fell barely from the prior yr to €186.1M and this was principally put all the way down to a worrying decline in documentary gross sales, which fell by 20% to €36.8M, a drop Unifrance blamed on “exports hit notably arduous by supply delays as a result of pandemic and bottlenecks in post-production.”
“Some productions couldn’t be shot for 2 years,” mentioned Jouanelle. “In the event you don’t have contemporary documentaries this will solely marginally be offset by gross sales of older reveals. However I’m assured issues will enhance.”
After 5 years at excessive ranges, animation exports have been additionally down by 18.5% to €60.8m.
Geographically, North America was France’s second greatest market with €23.3M Euros spent, nonetheless a manner behind Western and Central Europe with €80.6M.
Hemar additionally pointed to refined modifications corresponding to a rise in spend within the Center East by 13% and Chinese language spend being at its lowest stage for six years.
“We’ve not been in energetic in China for 3 years,” she added. “The scenario with their local weather doesn’t look good for the long run.”
