Mediawan sets tone for 2026 expansion

Mediawan is not a company that tends to twiddle its thumbs. The Paris-headquartered firm burst onto the European scene a decade ago, raising hundreds of millions of euros to propel a series of acquisitions that helped it become one of the continent’s fastest-growing production groups.

With the backing of US-based private-equity firm KKR among many others, the company boosted that growth trajectory into the 2020s, merging with German giant Leonine. But arguably some of its most eye-catching expansion – especially for those operating in the English-language business – has taken place over the past 12 months. 

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First came the acquisition of a 51% stake in Oscar-winning indie See-Saw Films in March 2025, the London- and Sydney-based outfit behind Apple TV’s Slow Horses and Netflix’s upcoming Grown Ups, as well as films such as The King’s Speech

Then came another coup in the shape of Clerkenwell Films’ exec producer Ed Macdonald, who was appointed to lead a UK outpost of Brad Pitt’s Mediawan-backed production firm Plan B Entertainment, fresh from its Adolescence success.

And before the year was rounded out, the French group took a minority stake in a London-based off shoot of Margot Robbie’s LuckyChap, with Netflix’s Mona Qureshi and the BBC’s Tanya Qureshi tapped to lead it.

Such moves would be headline-makers at any point over the past decade, but against the backdrop of a challenged industry landscape, Mediawan’s momentum has been especially noteworthy.

And the expansion has kept coming: at the end of January, the European group agreed a deal – valued in the region of $800m (£584m), according to sources – to buy Peter Chernin’s The North Road Company, home to Love Is Blind producer Kinetic Content, doc outfit Words + Pictures, and Chernin Entertainment, the label behind Apple TV’s Chief Of War.

While the deal is subject to regulatory approval, the implications are clear: once integrated, Mediawan’s annual revenue - estimated in 2024 to already be above €1bn (£870m) - will rise considerably further, with a footprint of nearly 100 labels across 15 countries, stretching from the US and Europe to Australia, Mexico and Turkey.

It produces a vast array of content, dominated by scripted TV and films but also including entertainment, docs, animation and formats. Overseeing the slate is group chief content officer Elisabeth d’Arvieu. Fittingly, she tells Broadcast International that her key takeaway from 2025 was the speed of industry change – from “the concentration of the market, to the technological advances of AI, to evolving regulations”.

“Globally speaking, it’s more confirmation that if you are not designed to be fast and nimble, then the chances of success are much lower,” she says.

For a creative group that is set to boast almost 100 labels around the world, being both “fast and nimble” must be a challenge. But d’Arvieu is adamant that Mediawan has such capabilities woven into its DNA thanks to a high degree of autonomy for its labels.

She adds that 2025 also taught her a lesson. “We encourage our producers and our teams to listen to the market and to what we think our audience wants, like crime shows, IP, or cast-based series, romance… but then suddenly an Adolescence occurs,” she says, pointing to Netflix’s juggernaut, on which Mediawan’s Plan B produced with Warp Films, among others.

While lighter-tone, returnable series might be the flavour of the day, here was a show – “about the most stressful and dark subject that you could ever imagine” – that cut through across the globe.

“It ticks none of those boxes, except for the absolute excellence of the writing [from Jack Thorne and actor Stephen Graham], of the interpretation and of the directing [from Philip Barantini].”

Such bullishness and belief in creative appears to underpin the broader Mediawan strategy. Founded by Pierre-Antoine Capton, a former producer and founder of Troisième Oeil Productions, alongside telco businessman Xavier Niel and banker Matthieu Pigasse in 2015, d’Arvieu says an “entrepreneurial vision” is at the heart of the firm.

“We were created, and we are owned and managed on a day-to-day basis, by someone who came from creation and independent production, and that is really what defines us,” she adds. That doesn’t mean d’Arvieu and the wider group are short on ambition, confidence or market savvy, which are all crucial qualities in a market where buyers are consolidating at pace.

“The market is tough and increasingly concentrated, and our clients are bigger and more powerful every day,” she says. “We need to be stronger too, and one way to do this is to leave our creators independent in terms of creativity while backing them when they want to be able to compete on big IP, or when they need international distribution, access to talent, or even gap financing.”

Global muscle

This is where Mediawan is looking to leverage its presence, not just in continental Europe but also increasingly in the UK and the US. Scripted is a tough and risky game, but the ability to provide financial support or readily find co-production partners is a “powerful tool to accelerate a project”.

And in a world in which two of the industry’s major buyers - Netflix and HBO Max – could merge, tooling up to compete via increased scale is vital, as evidenced by other industry M&As such as All3Media and Banijay’s potential combination.

For most production/distribution groups, the prospect of a Netflix-HBO Max combination is hardly ideal. D’Arvieu declines to talk about that potential takeover specifically, but concedes that “of course they are two important clients, among others, in the market. In broader terms, there is clearly consolidation happening in the market, so for us as an independent, leading European studio, we need to be very strong and armed to deal with our powerful customers.”

“The concentration of the market is a movement that we cannot stop, so we have to come up with the best shows that will trigger bidding wars”

Rights lie at the heart of the battle and d’Arvieu says Mediawan is being “very careful” about retaining them as much as possible.

“The concentration of the market is a movement that we cannot stop, so we have to make sure that we come up with the best content, the most premium shows, the ones that will trigger bidding wars.”

To do this, Mediawan is pulling several levers. One, as d’Arvieu points out, is making the most of lower production costs in Europe compared with the US. She adds that recent trips Stateside have become more fruitful following a sustained period of reduced US co-production activity, describing the shift over recent months as a “slight reopening”.

“They are also open to European co-pros, windowing and sharing rights, which is really a great thing,” d’Arvieu continues, adding that there is “fierce competition” among streamers to secure subscribers, heightening demand for stand-out series from Europe.

“We see ourselves very well positioned, and yes, certainly the fact that we are able to finance internally our own developments [helps],” says d’Arvieu, who points to a £87m funding deal with French private-equity fund Entourage Ventures in 2023. The pact has proven to be “a key accelerator” in getting dramas off the ground, she says, with a ‘pari-passu’ arrangement meaning that project risk is shared on a euro-by-euro basis.

“Entourage has been an amazing partner and we are looking to do more with them. We started with TV series, expanded into animation series and are looking and discussing with them about films. We are definitely interested to find those deals,” she explains.

D’Arvieu adds that the arrangement also allows her to talk to third-party producers about financing, creating “a very important way for us to speak to talents who are not yet part of our universe.”

Full English

Similarly, the expansion of Mediawan’s distribution arm under Sally Habbershaw is designed to support production budgets and gap financing, especially on English-language content. The former All3Media International Americas chief reports to d’Arvieu.

“We had grown so much on the production side with all those extraordinary companies that were coming in,” she says, pointing to firms such as Palomar in Italy, producer of UKTV acquisition The Count Of Monte Cristo, and Drama Republic in the UK, producer of Riot Women and The English. Their next series include the Bill Nighy and Helena Bonham Carter-starring California Avenue for the BBC and Prime Video’s Steal.

“We felt the need to expand distribution, because it is really another arm of production. We needed to relaunch it, and this is what we’ve done with the hiring of Sally.”

“The UK is clearly an important link for us – it’s a gateway to the US, because of the language, historical co-pros and the cultural exchange”

Mediawan’s sales arm – with a library in excess of 30,000 hours – is now based out of London. Coupled with the additions of See-Saw, Drama Republic, Plan B Europe and the minority stake in the London outpost of Lucky Chap, Mediawan is hardly hiding its intentions for the UK market, and d’Arvieu says the country offers “extraordinary” writing talent.

“The UK is clearly an important link for us – it’s a gateway to the US, because of the language, because of all the historical co-pros and the cultural exchange.”

The English-language push is also opening up Mediawan’s interest in Australia, a shift that began with the addition of See-Saw. “Look at Apple Cider Vinegar, from See-Saw and Samantha Strauss, which was a hit on Netflix. We are also working with her on Grown Ups for Netflix UK, and on both the creative and production side, Australia is a great territory to shoot in because it’s very efficient in terms of cost and incentives.”

Trend spotting

There are no label acquisitions in the works at present, but the interest is clear. “It’s also interesting because with the US market reopening for co-pros, Australia is often mentioned, alongside the UK and Europe.”

With such a broad purview, d’Arvieu is well placed to spot global trends. Romance, of course, is hot, along with evergreen genres such as crime, while relationship dramas such as Le Parfum Du Bonheur (Fragrance Of Happiness) from Merlin Productions and Ripley Films for France 2 have also enjoyed critical acclaim.

“Action is also a very big focus, everybody is asking for the next Hijack and we are very proud of Steal. And then longer seasons – longer than the traditional streamer shows, which might be six to eight episodes, maybe more like classic network television, of 10 to 15 episodes.”

While scripted accounts for around 70% of Mediawan’s revenues according to industry analysts, the imminent acquisition of North Road will reduce this and open up considerable US opportunities.

North Road will act as a US hub for Mediawan, with its leadership team and organisation largely retained, while Peter Chernin will join the Mediawan board.

“Pierre-Antoine also came from unscripted and entertainment, and the proposed addition of North Road in a couple of months is very strategic and very synergetic,” d’Arvieu says. With the deal not yet formally closed, the Mediawan content chief declines to go into details of what’s next, but says it will unlock opportunities.

“It is all about the group, because we’re asking, ‘How do you cope within this complicated environment?’ The fact that we are able to make synergies between companies across the group is a massive advantage, so Kinetic and all its expertise can come into Europe and work with all our unscripted producers, whether that’s in Spain, Italy, France or Germany, and build on that. It’s about building those cross-border synergies.”

D’Arvieu points to how this has worked on the scripted side, with shows such as Call My Agent!, produced by Mediawan’s Mon Voisin Productions alongside Mother Production. The French original, known locally as Dix Pour Cent, was remade around the world, including in the UK for Prime Video (Ten Per Cent), and a sport-skewing version is in the works as a movie with HBO, starring George Clooney.

But what about more unscripted acquisitions? “We don’t have a particular agenda in terms of what companies we want to partner with, but we will look if something makes sense and if it could be complementary,” d’Arvieu says.

“For streamers, [unscripted] is an important way of building subscriptions and retaining customers, so it’s certainly a demand of the market. For us, it’s a very important vertical and an area in which we have always intended to diversify, and the addition of Kinetic and the group will be a great help for that. We really intend to build on it.”

Given the events of the preceding year, few would bet against it.