For its 13th year, Asia Television Forum (ATF) will take place on December 4-7 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre at Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. The market and conference will be the setting for financing, co-producing, buying and selling of entertainment content across multiple platforms.
Although the number of Latin participants has decreased in recent years, five LATAM-based companies plan to take part in this year’s event. One of those is Telemundo.
“Asia has been, for many years, a priority for several obvious reasons; primarily, because of the cultural similarities between Latin America and Asia, also because through the years we have consolidated excellent relationships with leading regional broadcasters, and finally due to the importance and size of the markets and the many opportunities to reach new generations of audiences with scripted or non-scripted Telemundo original Latin content,” said Xavier Aristimuño, svp, Sales and Business Development for Asia & French-speaking territories
He added that, “Our greatest performing titles are broadcasted in the entire region and our best sellers are, or have been, locally produced. Turkey, China, The Philippines, Korea, India, and Vietnam to mention a few, are taking advantage of the quality of our well-produced U.S. content but have also considered locally producing these same stories for their local adaptations.
“The evolution and size of the Asian market will make an event such as ATF more relevant each year,” said Aristimuño.
Asked if he had any advice to offer ATF organizers, Aristimuño said: “To find a way to create more informal social spaces to better connect original content creators and newcomers with executives from established international broadcasters. Today, ATF is still a place for Europeans and American broadcasters, just to mention the ones that travel from quite far, to present and sell their content without always getting enough opportunities to better analyze new trends in Asia and new creative Asian ideas, gathering with Asian broadcasters’ in a less restrictive space than the one committed to tight business meeting schedules.”
But, while smaller companies — especially from Asia — are increasing their ATF participation, larger Western distributors are scaling-down their presence.
ATF organizers are trying to slow down the hemorrhage with a series of initiatives that, so far, don’t include the previously touted co-ventures with the Paris-based Reed-Midem. On the other hand, ATF will be introducing a series of initiatives in collaboration with other organizations that are having problems of their own.
This year for the first time, ATF will be held in conjunction with ScreenSingapore. Organizers expect the collaboration will help boost Asia’s production industry and encourage more international collaboration. It will put a greater focus on the trade component and likely foster cross collaboration between the film and television sectors.
Also new this year, ATF has partnered with the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences to debut the launch of the International Emmy Awards Nominees Panel and Screening, where nominees from Asia will discuss their work.
The International Academy will also be present for the first time on the ATF show floor, with an exclusive International Emmys branded lounge, open to ATF VIPs.
The international focus continues with a French Film Red Carpet premiere on Wednesday December 6 at 8 p.m.
ContentNOW, the conference portion of ATF, will kick off on December 4. Sessions will include animation, formats, kids, film co-production and financing among other topics. The opening keynote will be called “The Next 10 Years in Media (TV & Film) Are Asian.” Other conferences include “The Ultimate Content Creator: The Heroes Behind the Super Heroes and “The Future of TV: The New TV Player (featuring Michelle Guthrie, the APAC Director of Strategic Business Development for Google/YouTube in Singapore). There will also be an Asian Broadcaster series, with focuses on South Korea and Indonesia.
