Live from Space indie Arrow Media and The Valleys producer True North are among the first companies to win investment from Channel 4’s £20m Growth Fund.
C4 has also taken stakes of less than 25% in factual producers Popkorn TV and Lightbox as its scheme opens for business. Chief executive David Abraham described the deals as an attempt to “re-seed the real indie sector”.
C4 declined to reveal the terms of its investments, but admitted it had spent a quarter of its £20m fund. The four indies’ turnover ranges from £600,000 at Popkorn to True North’s £10.1m, according to Broadcast’s 2014 Indie Survey.
When Abraham initially mooted the Growth Fund in September last year, C4 was planning to invest in companies with a turnover of £2m a year, but this rose to £10m when the plans were formally set out in January.
The deals will form a key part of Abraham’s MacTaggart lecture at the Edinburgh International Television Festival on 21 August, where he will explore C4’s relationship with a production sector that is undergoing seismic consolidation.
Live From Space producer Arrow Media, which had a turnover of £7.9m last year, is perhaps the highest profile of C4’s investments. Co-founder Smithson said the deal would prove to be a “catalyst” for growth as the three- year-old indie eyes growth in factual entertainment.
His business partner Tom Brisley stressed the importance of Arrow keeping its independence, adding that the investment will lead to senior hires and bolster its ambitions in the US, where it already wins half its commissions.
True North co-founder and creative director Andrew Sheldon echoed Arrow’s ambition to remain independent. Improved access to overseas broadcasters was also a key attraction in partnering with C4. “To say to a US broadcaster that C4 is confident enough to invest in us is really important,” said Sheldon.
Popkorn managing director Rory Wheeler said the deal would allow the indie to bolster its development team and hire an executive to run its branded content department. He hopes it will help Popkorn, which made Channel 5’s Killers Behind Bars, win more business with UK terrestrials.
With offices in London and LA, Lightbox gives C4 a foothold in the US, which co-founder and Man On Wire producer Simon Chinn admitted was a “big factor” in the investment. Making further inroads into the UK is a key priority for the multiplatform specialist, which produced Xbox doc series Digital Revolution. It wants to grow its turnover from less than £10m last year to £15-20m.
Abraham heralded the deals as a “significant moment” for C4 and said more would be completed in the first quarter of next year.
The Growth Fund is overseen by Nutopia co-founder Laura Franses.
C4 Growth Fund indies
The London-based firm was set up by co-founders John Smithson, Tom Brisley and Iain Pelling in 2011 after the trio left Darlow Smithson a year after it was sold to Endemol.
The producer, which was responsible for ambitious C4 documentary Live In Space earlier this year, plans to use the investment to move into a variety of genres “under the factual tent”.
“Since we started three years ago we’ve grown in all sorts of ways,” said Brisley. “We’ve made live programming, natural history programming and factual entertainment. This will enable us to continue growing in these areas and push into new ones.”
Smithson added that Arrow would also boost the number of executives it employed.
“The business is about people,” he said. “You grow by having talented people who can bring the work in which grows the company. Having talented people delivering to a high standard allows you to grow strands and franchises.”
True North
Tying up with C4 is an “important stepping stone”, according to Andrew Sheldon, co-founder and creative director of the Leeds-based indie.
The producer of series including MTV’s The Valleys and CBBC’s Junior Vets, has experienced “accelerated growth” over the past two-to-three years and C4’s investment will help sustain this trend without forcing it to sell to a larger player.
“An indie of our size finds itself between a rock and a hard place,” said Sheldon. “In terms of growing a company of medium size, it’s quite a difficult thing to do on your own. C4 gives us the option to take the business to the next stage without selling.”
He added that the 13 year old production company will use the Growth Fund to address “three or four parts of the business” which will be its focus for the next 18 months.
“Although the money is an important part of it, C4 has got such a creative reputation and a great reputation internationally,” Sheldon concluded.
Lightbox
The non-fiction multiplatform producer has a significant presence in the US, with offices in Los Angeles, from which it has won most of its business including Xbox video game documentary Dumping The Alien and VH1 pilot Screen Love.
Co-founder Simon Chinn, who has produced feature docs Searching for Sugar Man and Man on Wire, is keen to use the investment to grow the amount of UK business won from Lightbox’s London office.
He highlighted the indie’s US presence and ambitious Xbox projects as key reasons for C4’s investment.
“C4 were keen to invest in companies with turnover of £5-£10m. We’re probably at the lower end of the scale, but I think they understand companies like us need help to become £15-£20m turnover companies,” he said.
“It’s a difficult transition to make, but it’s one of our mission statements to get to that level of turnover which we hope to do over the next several years.”
Chinn’s cousin and co-founder, Jonathan Chinn, who was awarded an Emmy for Fox doc series American High added: “It will enable us to scale up infrastructure both in the US and the UK in order to run multiple productions out of both countries.”
Popkorn
Multiplatform indie Popkorn is the smallest company to win investment from C4 with five full-time staff and a turnover of £600,000 in 2013.
Managing director Rory Wheeler applied for the investment after conducting a “company health check” in January.
Securing funding from C4 was more appealing than taking out a loan or looking for private finance, according to Wheeler. “We wanted someone big and exciting, and someone we felt aligned to our principles of cutting edge TV and quality branding,” he said.
The five-year-old London-based company, responsible for Channel 5’s Killers Behind Bars and electronics manufacturer LG’s online marketing, is ready to kick on to its next stage of development.
Wheeler is keen to invest in a “big hitting” executive to lead a new development team and a branded content specialist.
While Popkorn is keen to secure more returnable terrestrial TV series, it also holds ambitions to develop content for online platforms such as 4oD.
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