TV Formats for Every Continent

Izzet Pinto
CEO
Global Agency
Turkey

Can you tell us about your activities?

We mainly distribute formats and also represent a couple of telenovelas. Global Agency was originally founded in 2002 as a literary agency. It started out representing bestselling authors, but by 2006, we had begun to represent television format creators as well. Since then, our main business has become Television Entertainment, for which we have a great passion.

What are your titles for MIPTV 2009?

We will focus on "Perfect Bride" once again. Our second strongest format is "Super Talented." I call it "the mother of all talent shows" and we have great expectations for it. It's my favorite format. "My Ex vs. The Next" is another excellent format, which could go on to achieve critical acclaim. It's such a brilliant idea. "The Biggest Challenge" is also a fun one. As well as these TV formats, we are concentrating on a great telenovelas called "1001 Nights." NTV in Bulgaria just finished airing it and the ratings were way beyond expectations with an average of a 35 percent audience share.

What countries are important for your sales?

Each county is extremely important for us, but if you asked me to name the top three territories, I would say Japan, the U.K. and Brazil. Still, even small countries such as Armenia are very valuable for us. In the format business, you have the opportunity to compare cultures as each format performs differently in every country. It's great fun to watch the different versions that are produced, for example, the "Perfect Bride" format was a huge success across the Middle East. Prime time ratings were around 40 percent share. In Turkey, it broke all ratings records when the grand final reached a 71 percent share. That was a really unbelievable success.

Can you tell us about your sales strategies for 2009?

Our most popular format is "Perfect Bride," where mothers chose the brides for their son. We want this format to reach every continent and become a global success. This year, we will also focus on finding new formats for representation; however, we are very selective. Creators pitch tens of formats every week, but we pick only a couple each year. We are now searching for the next big thing. Our door is always open to format creators and producers.