Zodiak-Owned Yellow Bird Expands to Germany

STOCKHOLM, June 11: The
Swedish production company Yellow Bird, owned by Zodiak Television, is setting
up a new operation in Munich in a joint venture with Oliver
Schündler, currently the head of Bavaria Media Television.

Schündler will serve as managing director of Yellow
Bird’s German production venture, marking the company’s first expansion outside
of Swedish borders. The Munich-based outfit will focus on theatrical features
and scripted TV fare for the German-speaking market. Initial productions will
be based on rights that Yellow Bird already controls.

“I am very happy to announce that Yellow Bird has now
taken this first step towards a broad international expansion,” said Patrick Svensk, the CEO and
president of Zodiak Television. “The Yellow Bird business is crucial to our
strategy of building a strong rights catalogue which we can capitalize on in
all our territories.”

“By tapping into the rights catalogue that we have
already built, we expect the German business to be profitable much quicker than
what is normally the case for a drama start up,” added Mikael Wallén, the
managing director of Yellow Bird. “Entering this market is a very logical step
for us. We already have well established relations with Germany’s biggest
broadcasters and several of the authors which we have the rights to produce,
for example Henning Mankell, are very popular in the country.”

—By Mansha Daswani