Lionsgate Aligns Partners for Local-Language Film Initiative

SANTA MONICA: Lionsgate has teamed up with international entertainment executives Paul Presburger, William Pfeiffer and Clifford Werber to launch Globalgate Entertainment, which will focus on local-language film production around the world.

Globalgate has gathered a consortium of international producers, distributors and co-financing partners who will identify and provide access to IP for production as local-language films in territories worldwide. Consortium partners include Belga (Benelux), Gaumont (France), Kadokawa (Japan), Lotte (Korea), Nordisk Film (Scandinavia), Televisa/Videocine (Mexico), TME (Turkey) and Tobis (Germany).

In addition to properties controlled by its partners, Globalgate will identify third-party properties in the U.S. and internationally for development and production as local-language films. These films will then be distributed by the consortium’s partners and co-financed by the affiliated Globalgate Fund.

In addition to contributing to Globalgate, Presburger will continue as CEO of Pantelion Films and will focus his energies within the new venture on IP to be produced for Latin America and the Latino market in the U.S., as well as utilizing Pantelion’s intellectual property within the Globalgate network. Pfeiffer’s continuing role as senior advisor to Lionsgate will also align with his Globalgate responsibilities.

“I’ve known the Globalgate team for 25 years, and their experience, relationships and entrepreneurial skills will help establish the venture as a unique player in local-language film production,” said Lionsgate’s CEO, Jon Feltheimer. “By aligning ourselves with some of the top content companies in the world, Globalgate provides us with an opportunity to grow our presence in local-language films, leverage the content in our library and further mine exciting new IP and talent around the world.”

“Local-language films are competing successfully with Hollywood studio releases in market after market, representing a large and growing share of the box office in key territories around the world,” added Pfeiffer, Werber, and Presburger. “We’re pleased to partner with Jon Feltheimer and the team at Lionsgate, along with some of the world’s leading distributors, in capitalizing on this opportunity with a groundbreaking venture unique in its structure, focus and strategy.”

Gaumont’s CEO, Sidonie Dumas, said: “As Gaumont expands its footprint within and outside of France with production of both French- and English-language films alongside Gaumont’s worldwide television production, our alignment with Globalgate and its impressive array of partners promises to complement our strategies.”

Kenneth Wiberg, the senior VP of Nordisk Film, commented: “Although we have produced local language films for almost 110 years, we have over the past years experienced an enormous increase in interest from abroad in regards to Nordic content and IPs including a huge demand for international remakes of our films. With Globalgate, and by adding an experienced network of dedicated partners, we expect to be able to capitalize even better on our extensive Scandinavian-produced film library.”

Tobis’ Timm Oberwelland, Peter Eiff and Theodor Gringel remarked: “The Globalgate team has long shepherded winning material in and out of Germany. As we further build on Tobis’ long history and deep library, aligning with Globalgate and its partners provides us enviable avenues to access valuable material as well as exploit ours.”

Kadokawa’s executive officer, Daiji Horiuchi, said: “We are excited to have our vast library of films, books and manga adapted around the world by Globalgate. William’s decades at Disney, Sony, Celestial and Dragongate producing Japanese content, exporting Japanese content and importing commercial content into Japan will be invaluable.”

Lotte Entertainment’s CEO, Won Chun CHA, added: “We are thrilled to be part of this new venture. The Korean film industry has dramatically grown over the last decade, and there is a consistently high demand among local viewers for content variety. We believe the partnership will bring us a unique opportunity to exchange various intellectual properties from all around the world and very much look forward to working with Globalgate and other consortium partners.”

Belga’s Patrick Vandenbosch said: “Our alignment with Globalgate affords us the opportunity to draw upon unique scripts and remakes the world over and we are happy to be part of such a prestigious assembly of leading film companies.”

TME’s Kemal Kaplanoglu concluded: “With Globalgate, TME will further expand its production of Turkish films, which dominate our box office.”