M7 Group Buys Remaining Shares of SPI International

April 13, 2023 Kristin Brzoznowski
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Canal+ Group and M7 Group have decided to exercise their call option on the remaining 30 percent shares of SPI International, acquiring full ownership of the company.

Berk Uziyel and Loni Farhi have stepped down from their roles at SPI International. Erwan Luherne and Jeroen Bergman have taken over their respective responsibilities and roles.

Luherne, director of business integration for Canal+ International, and Bergman, board member of M7 Group responsible for content and business development, will keep working closely with Canal+ Group and M7 Group to continue to deliver top-quality content to audiences across the globe while also driving innovation, growth,and strategic synergies within Canal+ Group.

Luherne becomes managing director of SPI International. He has spent more than 18 years within the Canal+ Group. Luherne previously served as CEO of Canal+ Myanmar, director of marketing and commercial development for Canal+ International and director of commercial development for a Canal+ entity in Vietnam.

Bergman’s career includes 20 years at Liberty Global, where he was responsible for all programming and content acquisition. Before Liberty, he was commercial director for the Dutch cable company Casema (currently Ziggo). Since 2019, Bergman was managing the Film1 and FilmBox business in the Netherlands for SPI International.

Hans Troelstra, CEO of M7 Group, said: “SPI International has a long history of providing top-quality content to audiences around the world, and we are eager to take the company to a new stage of its development. Both Erwan and Jeroen have strong track records in the business so I have great confidence they will continue to bring great success to SPI.”

“We are committed to building on the company’s strong foundations and leveraging the Canal+ Group collective expertise to continue providing engaging and relevant content to viewers,” said Luherne and Bergman.