Filmmarket Hub: The marketplace for films and series in development

The start-up is involved with customers such as Amazon, HBO and Movistar Film Market Hubone of the 50 Spanish startups that are part of our fourth “Entrepreneurs List” is changing the way films and series are produced.

“We are the first online marketplace for feature films and series in the development phase. We are experts in connecting projects with producers, TVs and platforms OTT, such as HBO, RakutenTV or Movistar+, as well as sales representatives and distributors. We have developed a perfect tool to discover great scripts or find international partners. We already have more than 20,000 users from Europe and Latin America,” he says. Andrea Gianne.

Exactly 5 years ago he was in full development of a very ambitious film with a budget of 5 million, “but I faced the obstacle that in the city of Barcelona there were very few companies willing to direct a project like that , while in other countries yes».

Giannone researched further and concluded that statistically more good ideas go unimplemented and that to date one of the most lucrative industries of industrial relations and marketing has been in the idea incubation phase, as it was 60 years ago. During this process he thought if there was a space on-linethat would connect the different audiovisual markets of the world in the same place, the production of projects would multiply, there would be more work in the sector and more films and series on the market, ready to be consumed.

And with that idea he leaned on Bernhard Gomezwith experience in film production and in Christian von Silvawith a great track record of building large platforms on-line. “Our idea was to create a new way of doing things, more modern and fully adapted to the way the film industry works, but in a digital version to maximize the possibilities. Now when a screenwriter, director or producer has a project, they no longer rely solely on their local contacts; Thanks to Filmmarkert Hub, they can find resources and strategic partners anywhere in Europe or Latin America and realize their projects.”

Giannone admits that the beginnings of Filmmarket Hub were difficult due to the ambition behind the project, “but at the same time very gratifying and exciting, since from the first moment the platform has attracted the interest of large companies, which has allowed us to despite to make further progress with scarce resources.”

Faced with this situation, they decided to focus on the product and attract creative talent. «We started small in the city of Barcelona. We did all this recruitment through digital and content marketing strategies that allowed us to settle accounts from the first moment and after a year we already went to Madrid without having made another round».

To boost the market, they decided to create their own event called Pitchbox, and talent acquisition began to grow exponentially. «By 2017 we were already consolidated in Spain and we started shooting our first success stories, in particular three films that we knew would be released the following year. We raise a small round [de unos 700.000 euros] continue the capture and most importantly outsource the project to other markets and see if the model works. Last year we entered the UK and Mexico and with the arrival of our success stories on the big screen, Filmmarket Hub’s branding has improved and customer acquisition has multiplied by 500%,” emphasizes Giannone, who explains that the ‘Pitchbox’ are pitching Events where the best projects of the platform are presented to the most important companies in the sector «To date we have organized more than 14 and we have had special guests such as William of the Bull, Ron Perlman or the executive producer of the famous series Peaky Blinders«.

Filmmarket Hub faces two major Hollywood references: the platform The Black Listwhich connects film scripts to Los Angeles studios and from which films originate Slumdog Millionaire, blood diamonds, argus either The king’s speech; and the platform intended, specializing in financing projects. “We merged both models into a single platform and brought it to Europe and Latin America.”

Filmmarket Hub already has more than 1,200 companies on its platform looking for projects in the European and Latin American markets such as HBO, Amazon Prime Video, Rakuten TV, Movistar+, FOX Premium, Sky, Lionsgate, eOne, Turner, Virgin Media MediaPro, Atresmedia Studios, Filmax, Morena Films, EndemolShine Boomdog, Televisa, Dynamo, among others.

Plans include “continuing to move forward in the UK and Mexico while we begin opening up the German market. In addition, we are starting to develop more ambitious projects to improve our product, including artificial intelligence technology, to study the financial viability of projects in our market.” More specifically, for the development of R&D, they have support from the CDTI of more than Received €350,000 and will close a funding round for an additional €300,000 which will allow them to move faster across Europe.