Banijay CEO Bassetti Tells European Producers to Fight for IP Rights

Banijay CEO Marco Bassetti has called on European producers to hold their ground in negotiations with U.S. studios and streamers, arguing the real fight is over intellectual property, not investment quotas.

Speaking at a fireside chat at Rome's MIA market titled "What does it mean today to be a 'European champion' in an increasingly competitive global content market?", Bassetti told veteran Italian producer Marco Chimenz: "Who invests in creativity? It's us independent producers."

Banijay Entertainment, based in London, is the world's largest independent studio. Bassetti has led it since 2013, steering the Endemol Shine takeover in 2020 and, two months ago, the completed $8 billion merger of Banijay and RedBird IMI's All3Media. The combined company holds more than 265,000 hours of content.

What did Bassetti say about quotas?

He dismissed the fight over Brussels' investment quotas as misdirected. "The current battle [in Brussels] over [investment] quotas is instead entirely pointless," he said.

The quotas come from Europe's Audiovisual Media Services Directive, which forces foreign streaming services to invest a portion of their revenue into local productions while leaving the modalities to each country.

Bassetti, who described his view as personal, framed the wider European debate as being "about recognizing and providing compensation for creativity" across different legal systems.

What does he want instead?

IP retention. "The real fight should focus on studios and streamers recognizing and providing rewards for creativity" through producers retaining IP rights, Bassetti said. "Yet that is not what is happening."

He pointed to the UK as a working model. "When I work for a TV network — especially in countries like England — I retain ownership of the intellectual property," he said. "If I sell a series, the rights eventually revert to me after three years and there's a built-in incentive for the creator."

Continental Europe, in his account, tells a different story. "The reality is that we have no ownership, and it's extremely difficult to secure any, though things are starting to open up a bit," Bassetti said. "There's some movement regarding 'windows' — but it's only a partial shift. Ultimately, they [the studios and the streamers] still have total control."

What does this change for producers?

For now, not much — and Bassetti was candid about the limits of his own argument. He conceded that streamers treating production companies "as mere service providers" removes any incentive for creators to work with them, yet acknowledged the balance of power has barely moved. The UK model he praises depends on national arrangements that continental producers have not secured.

Banijay, for its part, is positioning itself to negotiate from greater strength. Beyond the All3Media merger — which saw All3Media CEO Jane Turton become deputy CEO of the combined company — the studio owns unscripted "super brands" including "The Traitors," "Big Brother" and "MasterChef," alongside scripted titles such as "Peaky Blinders," "Black Mirror" and "Hamnet."

Last week at the Mipcom TV market in Cannes, Bassetti said he saw an opportunity to grow Banijay's scripted production and hinted at an expansion into U.S. scripted. That, the source notes, might help improve Banijay's own terms of trade — which may be the practical point of the speech.

By Tom Whitfield