TV and movie production is expected to have generated close to EUR 22 billion last year in the 5 largest European markets alone. The COVID slump experienced starting in 2020 was largely offset in the year after, and the sector keeps on growing albeit slower last year in the aftermath of a relative deceleration of content spending from both broadcasters and streamers. Although each market didn’t meet the same fate during the pandemic: the UK suffered a much harsher blow in 2020, with TV and movie production revenues dropping by a whopping 24% year-on-year, while content spending was crashing by 28%, according to the national observatory BFI. Meanwhile, other Europe's top 5 markets only endured a maximum drop of 10% in content production revenues for 2020, with France and Spain hit harder than their Eastern neighbors. Despite slower growth of the content industry in 2023, big European content houses have reached new heights But each market recovered to pre-pandemic levels of revenues since 2022 already. 2023 nevertheless was marked by a contraction of content spending compared to the year prior, especially coming from OTT platforms which started cutting down on their inflated content acquisition budgets to refocus their strategy on more profitable investments. Spain was the slowest growing market in the last 2 years, but Italy reached new heights with a local content production industry evaluated at EUR 1.8 billion in 2022. The industry remains widely fragmented with 60% of revenues generated by companies with a yearly income under 10 million euros in 2022. The number of companies active in the audiovisual production industry is quite significant in some markets, estimated at 6,000 in the UK and 4,000 in France. It would mean that local producers in both markets only generate less than 1 million in local currencies each year. In Germany, the number of producers is lower, at around 2,000, which means that they generate an average of EUR 2.3 million in yearly revenues. But such fragmentation is receding under the impulsion of large production houses consolidating smaller studios and building a pan-European presence. Banijay, ITV Studios, Fremantle, Newen and Mediawan: pan-European production houses are thriving Banijay is the largest content production house in the region and is very well-represented across each of those markets. It published a cumulated revenue of EUR 3 billion in 2022, out of which more than 1.3 billion were generated in Europe's top 5 markets alone. The group gathered a significant position after having acquired Endemol Shine in 2019 and has been following through with a spree of smaller acquisitions since then. Fremantle is the second big regional actor, backed by RTL Group and holding Bertelsmann. Among its most well-known studios, it operates Germany’s...
