Most fiction titles commissioned in Europe in 2022 by the global streamers were produced in Spain and the United Kingdom, according to research by the European Audiovisual Observatory.
Some 39 global streamer titles were produced last year in both Spain and the UK. Both countries are home to significant Netflix production hubs, and have hosted major series such as The Crown and Elite.
The UK and Spain were comfortably ahead of the next country in EAO’s data with France producing 28 titles. The countries making up the rest of the top five were Italy (26) and Poland (21). Germany was seventh with 17.
For the purposes of the report, the EAO’s definition of ‘global streamers’ also includes commissions from European BVoDs not just global SVoDs.
However, supplementary data supplied by the EAO shows that the geographical production activity of the international streaming majors (Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Apple, Paramount, Lionsgate) fits a similar pattern.
The UK leads with 31 fiction titles commissioned in 2022, pipping Spain (30), and followed by Italy (26), France (25), Poland (20).
Netflix was the most active in 2022 ordering 21 titles in Spain, 15 in the UK, France and Italy. In total, Netflix commissioned 115 titles across Europe, with Amazon the next most active with 38. Disney had 9.
The EAO reported that, in the eight years between 2015-2022, the global streamers produced 129 fiction titles in the UK, 113 in Spain and 75 in the Nordics. Germany was home to 63 streamer titles and Italy 62.
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The report, titled Audiovisual Fiction Production in Europe 2022, found that global streamers released 228 original European fiction titles in 2022, spanning TV series and film, versus 127 in 2021. Some 50% of these were commissioned by Netflix and 17% by Amazon.
However, the report concluded that only 9% of fiction titles produced in Europe were commissioned by global streamers. By comparison, well over half of fiction titles produced in Europe in 2022 were commissioned by public service broadcasters (56%), followed by private broadcasters (35%).
The production mix of fiction titles varies considerably between countries. With large volumes of telenovelas and soaps produced each year, Germany, Poland and Greece were the leaders in volume of hours produced. Portugal and Hungary are two other examples of countries driven by series with more-than-52-episodes-per-season.
But, for TV films and series with shorter seasons of 13 episodes or less, the UK was by far the main producer, producing 171 in 2022, ahead of Germany (115), France (86) and Spain (63).
The BBC, Netflix and ZDF were the three main commissioners of series with 13-episodes-or-less-per-season.
International co-productions accounted for 7% of all fiction titles and were mostly limited to TV films and series with 13-episodes-or-less-per-season.
The majority of international co-productions used to be between two neighbouring countries sharing the same language such as France and Belgium or Germany and Austria. But non-linguistic co-productions have gradually increased and represented over 50% of all co-productions in 2022.
Non-linguistic co-productions were driven by the United Kingdom, Germany and projects between two or more Scandinavian countries. Spain, despite its recent production boom, had relatively few co-productions. The report speculated that this could be because so many new fiction projects in Spain are greenlit by the global streamers.
Almost 1,800 production companies/groups produced at least one fiction title between 2015 and 2022, but only 4% of them produced at least one title in each of the last eight years. The report said this ‘significant turnover’ could be because so many TV series are renewed for a second series: on average, between 2015 and 2022, first seasons accounted for just over half of all seasons produced each year.
In 2022, independent productions accounted for 84% of all titles produced, with 13% from production groups affiliated with a broadcaster but working for a third-party broadcaster.
The Banijay group, the RTL Group (the parent company of production giant Fremantle) and the Mediawan/Leonine Alliance were the three main producers of independent TV fiction, according to the report.
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