Spain Sales Surge, as Companies Embrace Split Rights Deals, Unveil New Sales (EXCLUSIVE)
variety.comEmiliano De Pablos Spanish super-indie production-sales companies are stepping back in time with vigor, building on opportunities opened up by streamers’ growing market flexibility to retain IP and sell territory-by-territory.
Prioritizing bottom lines over market share, global platforms are ever more splitting rights and investing less in single titles.
As budgets reduce, projects’ producers are forced to court ever more partners. That often means partnering on productions. “We accustomed customers to enjoying high-quality series with large budgets.
In the new context, it is increasingly difficult to continue in this vein if you don’t partner,” says Onza’s Carlos Garde. Aiding this, Spain’s TV drama sector is still living a Golden Age. “Spanish TV fiction presence is on the rise, both on platforms and on international pay TV and free-to-air channels,” argues Atresmedia’s José Antonio Salso, who is moving buzz title “Nights in Tefía” at MipTV. “There’s a large demand for Spanish-language content,” agrees The Mediapro Studio’s Marta Ezpeleta. “Its level and quality position it in places traditionally reserved for fiction from territories such as the U.S.” The streamers’ increasingly more limited production investment works in favor of indie sellers’ interests, allowing them to roll out sales territory by territory and retain more IP.
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