Sports and talent agency CSS has sold its stake in rights management company Target Entertainment to a city investor.
Sports and talent agency CSS has sold its stake in rights management company Target Entertainment to a city investor.

Entrepreneur Richard Thompson has bought the 58% stake for an undisclosed sum. He becomes non-executive chairman of Target and will work with chief executive Alison Rayson to build the company's new production and licensing divisions.

Thompson, formerly director of Leeds United, has a diverse portfolio of interests, which includes stakes in celebrity shoe maker Patrick Cox and IP Live, the live entertainment group that holds shares in Billy Elliot the Musical. In the past he has also financed indie Civilian Content

Target was set up by Rayson and shareholders Tiger Aspect and Talkback in 1998. However, both producer shareholders shed their stake in Target and were eventually replaced by CSS in 2002.

Rayson explained CSS's withdrawal from Target by saying that their "strategies are no longer aligned".

Target's catalogue includes Bad Girls, Footballers' Wives, Oblivious, Popstars, The Swap, Murphy's Lawand Fifi and the Flowertots.