MipTV 2010 - Day 1

A good MIPTV version is expected from today. According to the organization, 11,500 people will attend the whole show, the same as last year. At the last Mipcom there were 12,000 people, so the attendance trend is solid. The ‘MIP Formats’ day held yesterday was a success, with 600 attendees, from 350 people that were expected. And MIPdoc had a good outcome too, with 400 assistants comparing to 350 last year.

Mike Williams, director of Public Relations at Reed Midem, added that the buyers will be 4,000 this MIPTV, 5% more than last year, with an important growth of attendance, both about buying and exhibiting, from Russia, China and Singapore.

FRAPA, the association that protects format rights worldwide, celebrated its 10th anniversary in the industry with a 200-people cocktail where an alliance with WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) was announced, to reinforce legal format protection processes and to make the actions more economic to format owners. At this moment, FRAPA has legal actions running in 7 different countries. At the cocktail, BANFF introduced the pilot nominees for its June TV festival.

Market trends? Martin Irusta, SVP programming and acquisitions of NBC Universal for the international market, said: ‘We are optimistic for this year. In Western Europe the advertisement budgets still have to be recovered, but in regions as Central & Eastern Europe and Asia the growth is really important. Product trends? TV series as the ones we are producing, with high-end budgets. The pay TV channels need top original content to make the difference’.

Wolf Bauer, head of the top German producing group UFA, pointed out: ‘The European producers will depend on broadcasters to have a good year or not. The advertisement is not back, but they have to invest for sure not to lose share, as the market is very competitive. They are increasingly looking for low cost formats, so now in Germany we’ve installed a scripted-factual format factory. Entertainment and fiction continues well, but this one is a new German pitch for the market’.

The MIP formats day was set up in conferences, networking and pitching. Nigole Bezjian, from Think Plus Lebanon, commented: ‘The idea is very interesting, I was pleased to attend. Though, it was difficult to see the differences between the three areas, the event must mature’.

About the MIPdoc, the attendees stressed the networking experience held during the morning at the ‘Meet the top Commissioners’ session, where main buyers looking for documentaries to develop, were connected with producers. Taking the whole day, the more active buyers were Qasem Alaeizadeh from Irib Media Trade, Iran; Waheed Jamjoom from Jamjoom Productions, Saudi Arabia, Wolfgang Puetz from Servus TV, Austria, Mohammad Hesampour from Irib Media Iran and Murat Keskin from Samanyolu Yayin, Turkey.