Global Agency at 10

As Global Agency celebrates a milestone year, Founder and CEO Izzet Pinto talks to World Screen about the company’s path to success and what’s next.

The last ten years have been marked by skyrocketing growth and success for Global Agency. The company was founded in 2006 with only one project and a team of two people. Now, it boasts upwards of 120 titles and has a team of 26 strong around the world—with plans to expand the sales force further to 40 or 50 executives in the next two years.

Izzet Pinto founded Global Agency at a time when Turkey wasn’t necessarily on the global radar for selling its TV content abroad. With the format Perfect Bride, Pinto found healthy business outside of the country’s borders for Turkish concepts to be adapted successfully. The company spent its first two years focused solely on formats, before the addition of 1001 Nights to its catalog brought Global Agency into the Turkish drama business.

“Eight years later, we are still selling 1001 Nights!” says Pinto. “It has reached more than 75 countries so far.”

On the back of that success, Magnificent Century helped propel Global Agency’s drama business even further. Pinto says that the title, which has sold widely around the world, is responsible for nearly doubling the company’s revenues. Since then, myriad producers have been knocking on Global Agency’s door for the company to represent their projects in the international market.

“Our clients call us the ‘Masters of Marketing,’” Pinto says, highlighting the company’s penchant for buzz-generating, large-scale promotions and ad campaigns. “Each year we are investing more into our brand and into promoting the projects we represent. All of the A-grade drama producers want their projects to be with us, not with the smaller companies that don’t have the same high visibility as we do.”

Pinto says that while Global Agency is open to working with companies of all sizes, as long as the content is good, the core focus is on the “A-list players. That way, when the buyers come to us, they know that we have the leading projects.”

In addition to working with top-flight producers, Global Agency has been steadily adding more projects to its catalog that Pinto himself has created. Format creation is a passion of Pinto’s and is also good for Global Agency financially. “It’s very profitable for the company to own the IP itself,” he notes.

Currently, around 65 percent of Global Agency’s profit comes from drama and 35 percent is from formats. “My goal is to have it balanced at a healthy 50-50,” says Pinto. “In the past, only around 15 percent was from formats, so we’re seeing nice growth in our format business.”

The company is also now ready to explore new areas, and the mobile apps business is next on the horizon. “My goal for next year is to have a new division for mobile applications, including games and TV-related projects,” Pinto says. Global Agency is currently working on developing an application tied to the singing format The Legend, which Pinto created.

With all the success that Global Agency has had over the last decade, Pinto is keen to give back by helping the next generation of entertainment professionals. Bahçeşehir University in Istanbul recently launched a class entitled Global Agency, which Pinto is leading in an effort to teach students about the entertainment business. This comes off of his delivering a TED Talk at TEDxIstanbul this summer, making this a banner year for both Pinto and Global Agency. And much more is in store for the next ten years ahead.