Marathon’s Breton

April 2007

In January 2006, the
French production and distribution company Marathon merged with Finhera to form
the Marathon Group, whose businesses include Marathon Media, Télé Images and
Adventure Line. Marathon specializes in live-action series, game-show formats,
animation and documentaries. It has created such international hits as
Saint-Tropez, Totally Spies! and Nature’s Babies. Pascal Breton, the company’s
president, does not rule out further acquisitions in order to strengthen
Marathon’s position on the international market.

TV EUROPE:
Would you make more acquisitions if the opportunity came along?

BRETON: That is
clearly our strategy—during the next two to three years we will be
looking to make acquisitions, provided they are businesses that are
complementary to what we are already doing.

TV EUROPE:
You’ve had a lot of success with the series Saint-Tropez and Dolmen. What is your strategy for drama?

BRETON: The big
opportunity offered by the French market is that it is very immature. And
therefore there is considerable room for growth and for an increase in quality,
because currently there is only one weekly series, which is SaintTropez, and only one daily series, Plus Belle La Vie.
That’s it.

There are four main general-entertainment
channels plus about 15 smaller channels that will launch via digital
terrestrial television [DTT] by 2010. All these channels will have an enormous
need for daily and weekly programs. Marathon is in a good position to fulfill
their needs, and our drama strategy will essentially be to produce French
series, as well as co-produce series with Canada or the U.S. or with European
partners, in order to add some international [titles] to the mix. Obviously, we
would not make copies of Saint-Tropez even though it proves that we can succeed as a supplier of series
despite the fact that we are a small French company. We have to continue to
craft series very carefully as we did with Saint-Tropez: romantic comedies that take place in a beautiful,
well-known location, with an attractive cast, and conceived for the
international marketplace. We have, in fact, projects set in Cannes and in
Nice, and some even in Paris, and I think they will generate international
interest. The European market will open up a great deal with many more DTT
channels launching, and they, too, will definitely need to find quality series.

Our shows Sous le
Soleil and Dolmen illustrate that a French series can effectively increase a network’s
audience share. Dolmen almost
doubled the audience share of each of the networks where it has aired in
Europe.

TV EUROPE: With
Totally Spies! Marathon was
among the first European companies to break into the U.S. market. Has this
success opened more doors?

BRETON:
Definitely, but the goal is not only to open the door but to also have a
success behind it. We want to create hits, and all our animated series are
presold to American channels and to major European channels. Our production
standards are comparable to the highest-quality series today. We have found a
3-D animation production model that is unique and we have used it for the
series Monster Buster Club. We
are about to receive the first episode and we think that technology-wise and
artistically it will surpass some of our competitors. Our strategy is to be a
worldwide animation leader.

We want to create
long-running series…like Totally Spies! so that the property and the brand will be very strong.

TV EUROPE: What
are your strengths in the area of documentaries? The French have a long history
of quality factual programs.

BRETON: We have
always produced documentaries for the international market. Our strengths are
in natural history and programs about the world around us—tailored to
Discovery and National Geographic. And in the last few years we have also
developed a good catalogue of documentaries for children. This is a niche that
works well for us. We have programs about science, geography, world cultures,
all targeted at children. And we have developed our science documentaries considerably.
Major French producers want to work with us thanks to our strength in
distribution. Télé Images and Marathon have historically been very strong in
the documentary genre.

TV EUROPE: You are also active in new media.

BRETON: Yes,
new media represents 15 to 20 percent of our sales. We have created an Internet
division that is already profitable. It monetizes sites such as the ones for Sous
le Soleil and Totally Spies! We have created a channel for mobile phones for Totally Spies!
But we cannot move faster than the market, so we have to wait for the market to
structure itself and above all to find profitable business models. When those
exist we will offer the best content. Our goal is to be a leading supplier of
quality content.