British Investors Launch £500 Million Studio Fund

The Creative District Improvement Company (TCDI Co.), founded by British entrepreneurs Piers Read and Jeremy Rainbird to boost the U.K.’s film and TV industry, is putting up £500 million to support studios in the region.

TCDI Co. is committed to opening one million square feet of production space by 2024, making it the U.K.’s fastest-growing network of film and TV studios and will develop key educational partnerships and initiatives.

The strategy kicks off with the £50 million acquisition and proposed improvement of Twickenham Studios London, estimated to generate millions per year and add 2,500 jobs to the U.K. economy. Plans also include developing studio spaces in Kent and Liverpool, generating a further 2,500 jobs for the U.K. TCDI Co. plans to expand on the current success of Twickenham Studios and its existing campus by developing more production facilities, that will include film stages, flexible workspaces for creative industries with new event and hospitality space.

Anthony Lilley OBE, chairman of TCDI Co., said: “Despite the creative industries sector contributing 11 percent of the UK GDP in 2018 and growing five times faster than the national economy, increasing demand for studio and production space in the UK had threatened to derail Britain’s prosperous creative rise with a lack of funding, facilities and expertise. We at TCDI Co. have a genuine strategy that will address the space deficit and train the next generation of industry practitioners at each studio complex.”

Read, founder of TCDI Co., said: “Twickenham Studios is a much-loved studio, a world-renowned heritage brand and a fantastic trading company as well. We have significant capital to develop the estate and upgrade the facilities. As we continue to expand our operating studio platform throughout the U.K., including Liverpool and Ashford.”

Rainbird, founder of TCDI Co., said: “We are delighted to bring Twickenham Studios into the TSS family. We are living in a golden age of content that will drive huge employment for future generations to come. As the chairman and founding investor in Merman, the global TV, film and advertising content company, I know first-hand, how very much needed initiatives and facilities like these are. For our industry and for the next generation of content maker.”

Adrian Wootton OBE, chief executive of Film London and the British Film Commission, said: “The U.K. screen industries are enjoying an exceptional boom time and it is crucial that we capitalize on this by continuing to develop our world-class infrastructure and provide access to as much purpose-built studio space as we possibly can. I am therefore delighted by today’s news of this major investment by a U.K. company into U.K. sites, including the expansion of Twickenham Studios with its rich history of attracting filmmakers, bringing benefits to the capital and indeed to the U.K. as a whole.”