LOS ANGELES, CA - Indie distributor Gravitas Ventures has been snapped up by Red Arrow International, an arm of Germany’s ProSiebenSat.1. As part of the majority stake transaction announced today, all Gravitas Ventures employees will be retained and... (read more)
LOS ANGELES, Calif., June 10, 2015 (LA TIMES) -- Robert Redford's Sundance Cinemas is putting itself up for sale. Sundance Cinemas said in a statement that it has hired the investment bank Salem Partners to find a buyer for the small L.A.-based theater chain. Sundance Cinemas is part of several entities overseen by Redford... (read more) Millennium Entertainment, the distribution arm of Avi Lerner's Nu Image, officially went up for sale back in April 2013. Now there is a deal from within after entities like Luc Besson's EuropaCorp kicked the tires: The Millennium Entertainment management team led by CEO Bill Lee and private investment firm Virgo Investment Group are... (read more) Banking on the Vaults - Demand for digital deals has banks eyeing the value of film libraries12/14/2011
A few years ago, banks wouldn’t dream of lending against the libraries of indie film companies. Some are still skeptical, but others are starting to appreciate the long-term value of older content thanks to the digital distribution deals inked during the past two years with rising platforms such as Netflix and Hulu. “Digital media is starting to make independent distribution of films... (read more)
LOS ANGELES — A proposed sale of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the most powerful and lucrative studio during the golden age of film, drew only meager offers last week, and now Hollywood must confront a troubling question: Are movie studios becoming... (read more) What a difference a year makes. When Variety ran its Dealmakers Impact Report last September, the financial world was on the brink of collapse. This time around, it seems to be on the verge of recovery. But although dealmaking has slowed down, it has hardly ground to a halt, as... (read more) The growing influence of the Web to distribute news, video and other content, combined with the lingering economic malaise, have left many media executives and investors uncertain about where to make their next bets. The dilemma boils down to whether a modern media company should focus on building content at scale, or if it also needs to own the pipes to deliver that content... (read more)
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The financial crisis is forcing Wall Street banks and hedge funds to pull out of billions of dollars worth of film deals, opening the door for specialty investors to scoop up Hollywood assets at discount prices. From 2005 to 2008, hedge funds partnered with all the major banks from... (read more) The US financial crisis may have come as a shock to much of the world, but in Hollywood it almost seemed like the inevitable culmination of a continuing trend. That is because the relationship between Wall Street and the Hollywood film-finance business - one that was hot and heavy just... (read more)
In a year rife with bad financial news, the film-finance world has seen its share of worrying portents. Though some financiers suggest that conditions have in fact been deteriorating for considerably longer, in the 12 months since the start of the global credit crisis the outlook has grown steadily... (read more) If you're an aspiring director in India, one shotcut to Hollywood can open up if you gain a spot on a TV show called Gateway. That's an Indian reality program in which filmmakers compete for a shot at working on a movie in Tinseltown. For already established Bollywood film types, there's a more direct approach... (read more) LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Investors seeking riches in Hollywood are finding out why the movie capital is called Tinsel Town -- all that glitters is not gold. After pouring $15 billion into recent film deals, some investors have taken losses and many are demanding that film studios change how they structure the projects. Roiling credit markets have scared many away from non-traditional investments, while some... (read more) Hollywood's hedged bets; Studios share risks, and losses, with investors. But rules may change.2/16/2008
On paper, "Evan Almighty" looked like a sure thing. A spinoff of Jim Carrey's smash hit "Bruce Almighty," the film starred Morgan Freeman, reprising his role as God, and Steve Carell, one of Hollywood's hottest comedians. But "Evan Almighty" turned out to be a dud, with an estimated $250 million... (read more) Don't expect John Malone to show up anytime soon glad-handing Brad and Angelina on the red carpet. The billionaire dealmaker, whose Liberty Media Corp. (LCAPA ) owns pieces of lots of media companies, has famously stayed away from the all-too-risky movie business--once... (read more) In some spheres, the mere mention of the studio-slate deals elicits responses such as “disaster” and “complete wipeout” around Hollywood. But what’s the reality? The apocalyptic outcries refer to the performance of the private equity investments in studio film slates. One of the Warner Bros... (read more) The battle to conquer America’s living rooms with digital content heated up last week as Wal-Mart jumped into the movie download biz and players from Apple to Amazon.com to Microsoft moved to expand their offerings. But the next big show-down is likely to come over a piece of familiar hard-ware... (read more) The romance between hedge funds and Hollywood came out into the open last summer. But despite an inauspicious beginning — “Poseidon” may have sunk Virtual Studios’ ship — the pairing continues at full bore. Dozens more deals are in the works, but both sides are honing the fine points in order to make... (read more) Salem Partners LLC is pleased to announce that Kabillion, LLC has closed a private placement for an undisclosed sum with EM.TV, a publicly-traded, Munich-based entertainment and sports company. Kabillion is a multi-platform children's entertainment production and distribution company that debuted January 2007 on the... (read more) In an unusual exclusive arrangement, the Weinstein Co. has pacted with Blockbuster to make the vidtailer the rental outlet for all its releases. Four-year deal dictates that TWC will not make available any titles through competing rental outlets — including Blockbuster rivals Netflix and Movie... (read more) We are pleased to announce that Crown Media Holdings, Inc. has entered into a definitive agreement to sell its film and television library to RHI Enterprises, LLC for $160 million in cash. Through the transaction, RHI Enterprises, LLC has acquired various rights to film and television properties... (read more) |
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