Newly-christened Helkon SK - better known as UK distributor Redbus Film Distribution - has made a trio of acquisitions including Ed Burns' gangster thriller Ash Wednesday and Capitol Films' American Zoetrope production Jeepers Creepers.

The company founded by Simon Franks and Zygi Kamasa - now majority owned by Germany's Helkon - has also picked up the Steven Soderbergh and George Clooney-produced Welcome to Collinwood. Closer to home, the acquisitive Franks and Kamasa are executive producing Gurinder Chadha's Bend It Like Beckham.

Helkon SK - the SK stands for Simon and Kamasa - has also confirmed that Stewart Till will join its board now that Helkon has finalised its $16m take-over of the distributor. The former PolyGram international chief previously sat on the board of the distributor's former parent, Filmgroup.

Franks commented: 'We had agreed that we would keep the Redbus name, however since Zygi and I have become more involved with Helkon's European plans we felt it made perfect sense to change our name, adding SK to keep our own identity.'