English Entertainment
KI’s ‘Rising Star’ selected as flagship entertainment show to launch on new Cambodian Channel
MUMBAI: Keshet International (KI)’s trailblazing interactive talent format Rising Star has been licensed by the brand new Cambodian broadcaster Town TV. Building on its existing talent management agency and production company, Town Group will launch its new free-to-air channel in late 2016/early 2017 with RISING STAR as its flagship, prime-time weekend entertainment show. The must-see series will be produced in-house by Town TV.
Keshet International Asia head Gary Pudney said, “Rising Star is only just starting its life cycle in Asia. A success for CCTV China and RCTI Indonesia – which is soon to air its second season – it has proven its appeal with Asian audiences. I’m delighted that Town TV has chosen to brand its exciting new channel with Rising Star as the tent pole in its weekend schedule and am certain this is the first of many more deals throughout the region.”
RCTI will begin airing its second season this winter. Season one aired successfully and won a Panasonic Gobel Award for Best Program Talent Show & Reality Show in 2015. The format has also aired across China on state TV channel CCTV-3, where it achieved higher ratings than The Voice and a 30% growth in audience share from the first episode to the last. The finale was also the leading programme of the night across the whole of China.
Earlier this week KI announced two new hires in Asia, Sales Managers Cherry Lu (Beijing) and Kelvin Ko (Hong Kong). Both will report into KI’s Head of Asia Gary Pudney who has outlined the company’s intention to develop fully-fledged local production entities in China and India over the next two years. Since the opening of KI’s dedicated Hong Kong Asia HQ in late 2015 – following earlier successes such as the first season of MASTER CLASS China, which amassed more than one billion views online alone, RISING STAR China and Indonesia, and Spy(MICE) Korea – KI has licensed a number of its hit formats and premium dramas across Asia. The company recently announced the Indian remake of its premium award-winning drama format, Prisoners of War with one of the country’s leading general entertainment channels, Star Plus. The second 12 episode season of its children’s singing format MASTER CLASS, produced locally by 3C Media, has just finished airing on Beijing Satellite TV and Sichuan Satellite TV, and was the no.1 most engaging TV show (by click rate) on the social media site Weibo. KI Asia has also closed deals for MASTER CLASS in Vietnam (TTN Media Corp.), its branded entertainment car game show Trade Up in China (CCTV-2) and its original variety game show Who’s On Top in Indonesia (RCTI). RCTI is also home to series two of KI’s interactive talent show RISING STAR which will air this Winter. As well as selling into Asia, KI is actively acquiring content from the region and staffing up its local operations.
Produced by Tedy Productions for Keshet Broadcasting, Rising Star became the fastest-selling talent show on record when it launched in October 2013, now more than 250 episodes of the show have aired with upwards of 160 million votes tallied worldwide. In Brazil it has become one of the country’s most popular shows with unprecedented activity on social media – some 41 million votes were cast across two seasons and a third season is currently in the pipeline. The show aired successfully in Portugal and beat off competition from the World Cup football fixtures throughout season one. Both season one and two of the show also rated well in Argentina, with more than two million users downloading the Telefe app and 22 million votes cast across both seasons.
English Entertainment
Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders approve Paramount deal
Investors wave through a $111 billion megamerger but deliver a stinging, if toothless, rebuke over half-a-billion-dollar goodbye packages
NEW YORK: The shareholders said yes to the deal. They said no to the cheque. At a virtual special meeting on Thursday that lasted barely ten minutes, Warner Bros. Discovery investors voted overwhelmingly to approve Paramount Skydance’s $111 billion acquisition of the company — and then turned around and voted against the lavish exit pay packages lined up for chief executive David Zaslav and his fellow outgoing executives.
Not that it will make much difference. The compensation vote is purely advisory and non-binding. The Warner Bros. Discovery board can, and almost certainly will, pay out as planned.
But the symbolism stings. It is the second consecutive year that WBD shareholders have voted against the executive compensation packages, and this time they had good reason. Zaslav’s exit deal is, by any measure, extraordinary. Under the terms filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he is set to receive $34.2 million in cash severance, $517.2 million in equity in the combined company, and $44,195 in continued health coverage — a total of at least $550 million. On top of that, Warner Bros. Discovery has agreed to reimburse Zaslav up to $335 million for taxes assessed by the Internal Revenue Service on his accelerated stock vesting, though the company says that figure will decline depending on when the deal closes. As of March 11, Zaslav also held $115.85 million in vested WBD stock awards — and last month sold a further $114 million worth of WBD shares.
Shareholder advisory firm ISS recommended voting against the compensation measure, citing “problematic” tax reimbursements to Zaslav and the full vesting of his stock awards.
Zaslav will be bound by a two-year non-competition covenant and a two-year non-solicitation of customers and employees after the deal closes.
His lieutenants are not walking away empty-handed either. J.B. Perrette, chief executive and president of global streaming and games, is in line for $142 million, comprising $18.2 million in cash severance and $123.9 million in equity. Bruce Campbell, chief revenue and strategy officer, will receive an estimated $121.5 million, including $18.8 million in severance and $102.7 million in equity. Chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels is set for $120 million, made up of $6.6 million in cash severance and $113.1 million in equity. Gerhard Zeiler, president of international, will get $82.6 million, including $11.9 million in severance and $70.7 million in equity.
The deal itself, clinched in February after Netflix declined to raise its bid for Warner Bros., still needs regulatory clearance from the Justice Department and European authorities. Several state attorneys general are also weighing legal action to block it.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, was unsparing. “The Paramount-Warner Bros. merger isn’t a done deal,” she said after the shareholder vote. “State attorneys general across the country are stepping up to stop this antitrust disaster. We need to keep up this fight.”
If it does go through, the combined entity would be a formidable beast, bringing together Paramount Skydance’s stable — CBS, CBS News, Paramount Pictures, Paramount+, BET, MTV and Nickelodeon — with WBD’s portfolio of HBO, Max, Warner Bros. film and TV studios, DC, CNN, TBS, TNT, HGTV and Discovery+. Paramount has said it expects $6 billion in cost savings from the merger, which is Wall Street shorthand for mass layoffs on a significant scale.
The ten-minute meeting was presided over by chairman Samuel Di Piazza Jr., with Zaslav, Campbell, Wiedenfels and chief communications officer Robert Gibbs in virtual attendance. Di Piazza was bullish. “We appreciate the support and confidence our stockholders have placed in us to unlock the full value of our world-class entertainment portfolio,” he said. “With Paramount, we look forward to creating an exceptional combined company that will expand consumer choice and benefit the global creative talent community.”
Zaslav echoed the sentiment. “Over the past four years, our teams have transformed Warner Bros. Discovery and returned the company to industry leadership,” he said. “Today’s stockholder approval is another key milestone toward completing this historic transaction that will deliver exceptional value to our stockholders.”
Paramount Skydance struck a similar note. “Shareholder approval marks another important milestone towards completing our acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery,” it said in a statement, adding that it looked forward to “closing the transaction in the coming months.”
The shareholders have spoken on the merger. On the pay, they were ignored before the vote was even counted.
