Anna Marsh Maps Canal+'s $2 Billion Expansion and Africa Ambitions

By Elena Vasquez

Canal+ Group completed a $2 billion takeover of South African pay-TV company MultiChoice earlier this year, lifting the French media group's subscriber base above 40 million.

After a busy year spanning two continents, Anna Marsh said acquisitions had strengthened Canal+ Group amid what she called unprecedented industry disruption. Marsh is CEO of Studiocanal and deputy CEO and chief content officer for Canal+. The New Zealand-born executive spoke in Rome on Wednesday at MIA Market with MIA head Gaia Tridente.

What has Canal+ Group acquired?

Marsh outlined three acquisitions across distribution, cinema and pay television: a majority stake in Lucky Red in February, 34 percent of UGC earlier this year and the $2 billion MultiChoice takeover. Canal+ acquired a majority stake in Rome-based Lucky Red, a distribution and production company. UGC is the Paris-headquartered film studio that operates one of France’s leading cinema chains.

The $2 billion MultiChoice takeover helped push Canal+ Group’s subscriber base north of 40 million, Marsh said. More than half of those subscribers are English-speaking, a result of MultiChoice’s reach across the African continent.

She said, “That just opens a wealth of opportunity,” about the growth. The three purchases gave Canal+ production, distribution, cinema and subscriber scale across two continents.

Why is M&A a content tool?

Marsh treated expansion as an operational necessity in a fast-moving business, where acquisition brings fresh perspective, answers unresolved questions and opens access to new territories. “It’s really important to have a fresh perspective. People that are going to challenge the status quo. Because the business is moving so fast,” Marsh said.

“The audience is so tough that we constantly need to be looking at ourselves in the mirror. AI is emerging right now. We’ve got enormous consolidation in the U.S. Looking at the different ways that the borders between pay TV and free TV are colliding,” Marsh continued.

Her case for expansion was direct: “There are so many questions to ask. Nobody has all the answers. When we’re able to expand, when we’re able to acquire new companies and enter into new territories, it’s truly enriching.”

For Marsh, buying companies is part of keeping pace with changing viewing habits.

What did GREENLit show?

Speaking on the heels of GREENLit, MIA Market’s flagship drama showcase, Marsh joined an event that offered industry attendees an exclusive first look at four upcoming international series. One was “Gucci: Game Over,” a six-episode miniseries based on Allegra Gucci’s memoir. Sky Studios and Lucky Red co-produced it, while Studiocanal distributes it internationally.

Marsh praised the series as a testament to “the culture, the courage, the history that Europe’s been blessed with.” She added: “I think Europe has a great future when it comes to storytelling. And the depth of the stories that we can tell here is absolutely endless.”

The showcase showed one direct result of the acquisitions: Lucky Red co-produced a six-part international series for Studiocanal.

How is Africa changing the slate?

Marsh linked the subscriber deal to a concrete production push through two series with direct South African production links, including an apartheid-era drama and a Canal+ original. She named Cynthia Erivo, Thabo Rametsi and Guy Pearce as the stars of “The Road Home,” whose shoot recently wrapped in South Africa. She also cited “Shadow Has Fallen,” a Canal+ original action series whose third season wrapped in Cape Town.

Her strategy was explicit: “That’s a really strategic part of the group’s focus right now,” she said of Africa expansion. “And you can really see how Studiocanal is at the heart of that strategy. If we, as Canal+, enter a new market with so much potential as South Africa, we have to have a strong content strategy.”

The Africa plan joins subscriber growth with new drama production in South Africa.

How does existing IP reduce risk?

Studiocanal Stories, launched in 2024, turns familiar books into a business tool that supplies a built-in audience, greater confidence, and more money and data for decision-making. Pointing to the blockbuster “Paddington” franchise, Marsh called it the company’s “biggest, most successful IP” to date and noted that it “started as a book.”

She said optioning existing IP “allows us to relax a little bit” because it comes with a built-in audience. Her explanation was practical: “It does give confidence,” she said, “and it does allow us to put more money and more data behind the decision-making.”

Existing books give the group an audience and more data for its decisions.

Can star power guarantee a hit?

Despite that confidence, Marsh said talent remained a central measure. “What Happens at Night,” an upcoming psychological horror, adapts Peter Cameron’s 2020 novel. Apple Studios produces it in partnership with Studiocanal. Martin Scorsese directs, with Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence starring. Marsh called Scorsese “one of the greatest cineastes of all time” and said the film was as close as one can get in these uncertain times to “a bit of a slam dunk.”

Her confidence stopped short of certainty: “It is harder and harder to hit the bull’s eye.” She added: “Audiences are becoming more and more difficult and their standards are constantly raising.” For Gen Z viewers, she warned, “there’s just no room for error.”

The combination illustrates Marsh’s central tension: recognizable books and major stars reduce some uncertainty, but rising audience standards leave little margin for misses in an industry she describes as moving very fast. The 12th edition of Rome’s MIA Market runs Oct. 19–23. Canal+ Group’s next test is whether acquisition-led scale can keep pace with audiences whose standards keep rising.