The merged Banijay–All3Media business will prioritize “eliminating duplication” in distribution and sales, as part of cost-saving plans attached to the deal.
During an investor call this morning, Banijay Group CEO François Riahi was clear on the plan to find €50M ($59M) in synergies within 12 months of the deal closing this fall, as he called the RedBird IMI-owned All3 “a great company that we have been aiming [at] for several years.”
“These synergies are broadly split into three areas,” he added. “First, increased coordination across distribution and sales, eliminating duplication and improving commercial efficiency.”
Further savings will be found through “the optimization of central and support functions, and a far more integrated approach to procurement,” he added.
Banijay has emphasized potential sales arm savings at the same time as saying that the combined group’s 170 creative labels will be protected.
“There is no duplication in talent and creativity. We want to keep all our talent, all our creative labels as they are now. We want to give them more,” Banijay CEO Marco Bassetti told Deadline. “We would be stupid to cut creative people in our group because that’s one reason why we made this deal.”
Currently, Cathy Payne leads Banijay’s sales arm as CEO, Banijay Rights, with Louise Pedersen in charge of All3Media International in the same post. Both are considered by peers to be successful operations, but it is here where duplication is most obvious. In terms of production, Midsomer Murders firm All3 is heavily weighted to the UK and U.S., whereas Big Brother seller Banijay has more diversified assets across the Americas, Asia Pacific, and Europe.
The merged company will have a massive program catalog of more than 260,000 hours, with a large proportion of this coming from Banijay, which has consolidated the likes of Zodiak Media and Endemol Shine Group in the past decade. Both of these brought cost-cutting, including layoffs.
Sophie Kurinckx, Banijay Group CFO, said: “We demonstrated in the past with Zodiak and also the Endemol integration, we have a strong track record on this. We are very confident to implement these [synergies] in this time frame. If we combine the two groups, we will have a coordination to be made, for example, in the distribution business.”
The combined group would have generated revenues exceeding €4.4B ($5.1B) in 2024 with adjusted EBITDA of €690M ($800), bringing Banijay Group’s total 2024 pro forma revenues to €7.4B ($8.59B).
Marco Bassetti, currently CEO of Banijay Entertainment and Banijay Live, will serve as CEO of the newly formed group. Jane Turton, currently CEO of All3Media, will become Deputy CEO. Jeff Zucker, CEO of RedBird IMI, will become Chairman of the board of the new combined entity. Banijay and RedBird will have a 50-50 equity split, with RedBird paying Banijay €625M to reach shareholding parity.
“Our proven track record of successful integration, and especially as Marco will be leading the business, gives us confidence we are able to implement [the planned synergies] in a short time frame energy,” said Riahi.