Lionsgate Profit Soars

SANTA MONICA/VANCOUVER: Boosted by increased revenues from television production and its Mandate Pictures division, as well as contributions from TV Guide Network, Lionsgate’s net profit for the first quarter of fiscal 2010 soared from $3.5 million to $36.3 million.

The company reported overall revenues of $387.7 million, a 30-percent increase on the $298.5 million recorded in the year-ago quarter. The results include $27.8 million from TV Guide Network and TV Guide.com, which the independent studio acquired in February (and subsequently sold off 49 percent to One Equity Partners in May.)

Overall motion picture revenues gained 6 percent to $272.7 million. This included $22.7 million in theatrical revenues, a 26-percent reduction, as the studio had just one release in the period (Crank: High Voltage). Home entertainment revenues fell 6 percent to $151 million, and television revenues in the motion pictures segment fell 29 percent to $20.6 million. International revenues fell 5 percent to $32.5 million. However, Mandate Pictures’s contribution jumped from $8.5 million to $53.1 million.

In the television production segment, revenues were up by 112 percent to $87.2 million, thanks to U.S. licensing intake from Lionsgate Television and Debmar-Mercury, and new revenue from the Ish Entertainment joint venture. Gains were also recorded in international revenues and home-entertainment.

"As anticipated, we had a strong and profitable growth quarter that puts us on track to meet our financial targets for the year," said Jon Feltheimer, co-chairman and CEO. "We are particularly pleased that, beyond the solid financial story, we saw significant positive developments across nearly all of our businesses, including new distribution and syndication orders for Debmar-Mercury shows, new television series entering the production pipeline, important programming acquisitions for TV Guide Network, the first in a series of anticipated carriage deals for Epix and new branded channel launches in Asia.  The real story this quarter was the continued strong growth of our diversified asset base."