Sony Footage Tv sealed a deal to accumulate Industrial Media, a significant nonfiction TV manufacturing firm whose portfolio contains “90 Day Fiancé,” “So You Suppose You Can Dance” and “American Idol.”
The deal values Industrial Media at $350 million. Upon closing, Sony Footage will purchase a majority controlling curiosity in Industrial Media however the studio declined to disclose its possession proportion.
Industrial Media’s manufacturing shingles embody 19 Leisure, B17 Leisure, Home of NonFiction, Sharp Leisure, the Mental Property Company (IPC), This Machine Filmworks, This Radicle Act and Trilogy Movies.
The corporate firms produce greater than 100 applications distributed worldwide in genres together with documentary, music competitors and actuality classes. These embody the hit “90 Day Fiancé” franchise for TLC, “Indian Matchmaking” for Netflix, “We’re Right here” for HBO, “The Curse of Von Dutch” and “The D’Amelio Present” for Hulu, “Secrets and techniques of Playboy” for A&E, “Selena+Chef” and “Craftopia” for HBO Max, “So You Suppose You Can Dance” for Fox, and “American Idol” for ABC (co-produced with 19 Leisure).
All collectively, the Industrial Media group has about 100 workers in L.A., New York and Atlanta. SPT’s deal to purchase the corporate is topic to customary closing situations, together with regulatory approvals.
Eli Holzman, Industrial Media CEO and founder/CEO of IPC, will be a part of Sony Footage Tv as president of nonfiction leisure upon closing, reporting to Ravi Ahuja, chairman of worldwide tv studios and Sony Footage Leisure company improvement. Aaron Saidman, Holzman’s longtime producing companion who’s Industrial Media president and IPC co-founder and president, will be a part of the corporate as co-president, nonfiction leisure, reporting to Holzman. Collectively, Holzman and Saidman will oversee day-to-day operations of Sony Footage Tv Nonfiction.
“At SPT, our focus is on management and high quality in rising areas of tv, and nonfiction content material makes up a major share of TV viewing,” Ahuja mentioned in an announcement. “Buying Industrial Media offers us scale and experience that properly enhances our present TV manufacturing companies. Eli, Aaron and their gifted group of producers have persistently succeeded with high-quality collection and documentaries.”
Along with the deal for Industrial Media, Sony Footage TV introduced that Suzanne Prete, who at present oversees “Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy,” will add oversight of different recreation reveals produced by SPT in her new position as EVP of a newly fashioned recreation present manufacturing division. Prete, who joined SPT in 1995, studies to Ahuja.
Industrial Media was fashioned because of Crestview Companions and funds and accounts managed by BlackRock buying CORE Media Group in 2016, with UTA subsequently taking a stake within the firm and advising on its turnaround. The brand new house owners recruited media govt Dennis Miller to function chairman. In 2018, CORE acquired IPC and Holzman and Saidman had been appointed CEO and president, respectively, and the corporate was renamed Industrial Media.
In a joint assertion, Crestview Companions co-president Brian Cassidy, BlackRock director Jeff Gordon and UTA CEO Jeremy Zimmer mentioned: “We got down to develop Industrial Media right into a preeminent tv manufacturing entity and we’re thrilled that Sony Footage Tv noticed the worth within the large model we now have constructed. We’re extraordinarily happy with Eli Holzman, Aaron Saidman, Matt Sharp, and Dennis Miller. Their artistic power and astute enterprise acumen have turned Industrial Media into a significant content material provider. Sony is the right dwelling for Industrial Media and we sit up for seeing it proceed to flourish as Sony Footage Tv Nonfiction.”
Since Holzman and Saidman took the helm at Industrial Media three years in the past, the corporate has practically doubled in measurement and the multi-Emmy successful founders stay among the many most prolific producers within the nonfiction section.
Industrial Media’s crew of creatives contains Matt Sharp, CEO and Founding father of Sharp Leisure (TLC’s “90 Day Fiancé” franchise, Journey Channel’s “Man v. Meals”); RJ Cutler, president, This Machine Filmworks (“Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry” on Apple TV Plus); Brien Meagher and Rhett Bachner, founders of B17 Leisure (“Chasing the Treatment,” “Craftopia,” “Thanks a Million”); filmmaker Daybreak Porter, founding father of Trilogy Movies (director and govt producer of the psychological well being docu-series “The Me You Can’t See” alongside Oprah Winfrey and Prince Harry); filmmaker Alex Stapleton, founding father of Home of NonFiction (docu-series “Satisfaction” for FX); and actor, director and producer Don Cheadle, whose manufacturing firm This Radicle Act focuses on creating TV and movie content material for all platforms.
Holly Jacobs, SPT’s EVP various and syndicated programming, will oversee the combination of the Industrial Media crew and assist “guarantee a easy transition of SPT’s present unscripted collection” earlier than she transitions to a full-time unbiased producer beneath an general take care of the studio. Underneath the deal, Jacobs will develop and govt produce unique programming for the studio and proceed to assist SPT reveals at present in manufacturing. Since establishing the studio’s various programming division 15 years in the past, Jacobs and her crew have produced long-running reveals together with “Shark Tank” and “The Dr. Oz Present,” together with “The $100,000 Pyramid,” unique collection “Homicide Home Flip” and “Males in Kilts,” and primetime specials “Jeopardy! The Biggest of All Time,” “Superstar Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy! Nationwide Faculty Championship.”
In a joint assertion, Holzman and Saidman mentioned: “That is essentially the most thrilling time within the nonfiction enterprise with extra alternative and extra content material being made than at some other interval within the historical past of the style. At Industrial, we now have assembled a few of our business’s most sought-after storytellers. And now we now have partnered with a number one unbiased provider to the worldwide movie and tv market. Our ambition in working with Tony, Ravi and the Sony Footage Tv crew is to supercharge our progress, amplify our potential to draw the easiest expertise each in entrance of and behind the digital camera, and to proceed pushing the boundaries of the medium.”
Moelis & Co. served as a monetary adviser to Industrial Media in reference to the transaction.
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