Jon Penn

 

Earlier this year, FremantleMedia Enterprises (FME) named Jon Penn as its CEO for the Asia Pacific. The move was part of the company’s shift toward a more regional structure, with Penn overseeing program sales, home entertainment, consumer products, online and mobile initiatives, digital content, sponsorship and live events. Penn spoke to TV Asia Pacific about his plans for expanding FME’s brands in the region.

 

TV ASIA PACIFIC:What is your overall strategy for FME’s Asia-Pacific business?

PENN: The strategy is to grow the properties we have across the region through our various business operations, to ac­quire and develop new properties, continue to grow our network of content partners, and develop our activity in key markets such as India, Japan and China.

 

One of the most exciting things about FME Asia Pacific is having this regional focus while remaining part of the bigger FME global community. This gives us a real competitive advantage in that we’re able to offer our clients a global one-stop shop but with invaluable local knowledge and expertise.

 

TV ASIA PACIFIC: What are the advantages of having a single structure for TV distribution, home entertainment and licensing?

PENN: Along with the strength of our global network, this structure is what sets us apart from our competitors. It allows us to manage brands in the most effective way by taking advantage of opportunities very quickly where they exist within distribution, licensing and home entertainment around the world. We can optimize TV transmission dates and coordinate licensing campaigns and home-entertainment releases internationally where appropriate. Our approach is to manage brands for longevity. It’s one of the principles that FME is built on and has been a driving factor in our success globally.

 

TV ASIA PACIFIC: What are some of your strongest markets in terms of TV distribution, and where do you see opportunities for growth?

PENN: Australia and New Zealand are very well established distribution territories for FME, and we’re seeing healthy growth in other Asia-Pac territories. For instance, we’ve done numerous pan-regional deals where programming such as Grand Designs, Jamie’s American Road Trip and Project Runway are available. TV shows such as The Adventures of Merlin, American Idol and The Strip are proving popular with Chinese audiences, and our Original Productions shows—produced by Thom Beers—have found buyers in Vietnam. We’d like to make more inroads in India, China, Korea and Japan across all our business operations.

 

China and India have the right combination of high economic growth, young populations and engagement with media—particularly mobile and digital media. Our goal in these markets is to grow our activity across all divisions and to establish more relationships with producers, commercial partners and broadcasters.

 

Earlier this year, we launched a joint venture with a leading production company in China called Asian Union. The JV is called Vision Ventures Media and is dedicated to increasing the trade of factual programs to and from China. Through this venture we’ve launched a syndicated channel called Vision, consisting of factual programming supplied by FME. Launched in January 2009, it is already airing in cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing and Fujian.

 

India is a really vibrant, exciting media-and-entertainment market. We have growing businesses there in TV and licensing, driven from the presence of two of our major entertainment formats—Indian Idol and India’s Got Talent. We expect to do a lot more over the next few years here.

 

Japan is the world’s second-largest economy, so is obviously a very important area for us. TV has been good for us with sales of The Adventures of Merlin and Live from Abbey Road, but the rest of the business needs to be further developed. We’re continually looking for the right partners who are aligned with our business strategies and innovative ideas as we move forward.

 

TV ASIA PACIFIC: Last year FME partnered with Singapore’s MDA for Kylie Kwong: My China. Are you looking to develop other similar partnerships to develop a catalogue of Asian content?

PENN:Absolutely. One of our strengths is in partnering with the best producers and content owners around the world. For instance, in Singapore we’re working with companies including Ochre, Verite and IFS. Third-party Asian content is high on our priority list.

 

TV ASIA PACIFIC:What are your main priorities for 2010?

PENN:In 12 to 18 months’ time, I’d like to be able to look at a list of local partners—on-screen talent, producers, government, etc.—who FME is working with to develop great pro­jects across all genres. We’ve started that list already with our partnership with the MDA, where we’ve committed to investing in multimedia TV projects by Singapore-based producers. Similarly, we represent a number of successful Australian dramas such as The Strip and Satisfaction, both of which are doing really well internationally. We have a track record of working with the best production partners globally, and one of my goals is to continue that in Asia Pacific.

 

I’d like to grow our licensing programs across all our brands and continue our acquisition of third-party rights. We were recently appointed as official licensing agent for CBS Consumer Products across Asia.

 

We’ve had great success in Australia with a project called Road Tour, which was produced exclusively for MySpace.com, and doing more digital media projects throughout Asia Pac is one of our objectives.

In home entertainment, we have a very strong business and work with some great partners, including Roadshow Entertainment in Australia and New Zealand. Again, growing this business in other territories is a key objective.