Forefronting Its VOD Offer, Catalonias 3CAT Presents the New Face of TV in Spain

Posted by Reinaldo Massengill on Sunday, March 10, 2024

CANNES — Televisió de Cataunya (TVC), best known abroad for its biggest linear channel, TV3, will re-launch on Oct. 30 as 3CAT, the name also of its new AVOD platform, bowing as the driver of the most far-reaching digital makeover of any TV operator in Spain.

Also incorporating Catalunya Radio, the Catalan-language 3CAT reflects a larger pivot in Europe where broadcasters are starting to look at their VOD platforms as either SVOD profit centers, or at least as a very key part of their business. This is the case of state-owned networks as they seek to reach out to catch an ever larger part of the audience which doesn’t watch TV on TV, so still fulfilling their public service remit. 

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This trend can be seen in and outside Spain, with France Télevisions and the BBC moving their OTT offer front and enter when it comes to acquisitions. 

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No other operator in Spain is driving harder to a hybrid OTT-linear offer than 3CAT, which serves Catalonia, from Barcelona, its capital, to Lleida in the West, the Ebro river in the South, and to the North the Pyrenees on the French border.

“In order to give you an idea of 3CAT’s public broadcasting service ambition, we are creating more than 200 hours of digital exclusive 3CAT original content, including talent shows, factual series, fiction series and documentaries,” Pío Vernís, 3CAT audiovisual business director, said at Mipcom.

He added: “We are also adding around 150 hours of fresh entertainment from around the world, mainly fiction and factual, and around 20 original 3CAT  digital-first shows, premiering on our VOD platform, and then to be linear broadcast.”

At Mipcom, Vernís, eagerly talked up 3CAT banner scripted series “This Is Not Sweden,” a four-country co-production, as a prime example for the new direction which 3CAT will be taking.

Co-produced by Spain’s RTVE and TV3 with Sweden’s SVT, Germany’s NDR and Finland’s YLE, the eight-part comedy is set in a swish upper middle-class community in the placid hills outside Barcelona. A Spanish young parent couple moves there to give their children the best way of life, inspired by northern European models. 

“We need to encourage Catalan producers to look for new sources of financing like this,” he said. “They always go to Spanish hubs like Madrid, focusing on their own market. For me, it’s more interesting to also look internationally,” Vernís added.  

Once financing shows 100%, as costs have spiked and ad revenues dropped for free-to-air operators worldwide, TVC, now 3CAT, is embracing split-rights deals.

Romantic comedy series “Dating in Barcelona,” a 3CAT highlight, is co-financed with Filmax, which takes international rights and by Prime Video Iberia. 

In intricate windowing, Eps. 1 and 2 will be available in the Catalan language on TV3 and 3CAT, Prime Video then releases all episodes in Spanish a day or two after, and then 3CAT uploads an episode every week.

Vernís declined to give financial details. However, if a platform comes in for domestic, covering, say, 30% of the new series’ budget, and a sales agent puts up 20% against international via minimum guarantee, taking into consideration inflation a TV operator may get a series for 70% of former costs. 

“By co-producing, we can produce more series, and at the same time access some series according to today’s costs,” said Vernís. 

Young adults will move front and center in terms of content at the relaunch. 

“We will be focused, during the launch, on our offer for young adult audiences in the Catalan language,” said Vernís.

One 3CAT era title, ”Never Have I Ever,” is a teen, young adult dramedy and musical. “It is one of our more promising bets for the upcoming season,” he said. The coming-of-age story takes place in a summer camp where a counsellor goes missing in the woods. 

From the creators of highly popular multi-season ‘Crimes’ which sold to Movistar, Netflix, and ZDF, among others, another title, “Tor,” fully financed by the group, is a factual true-crime show based on a mystery in the Pyrenees. 

3CAT is also celebrating the comeback of late night host Andreu Buenafuente, hailed as Spain’s David Letterman, in what Vernís calls a “super refreshing late night show.” 

This show will play on TV3, as 3CAT rings the far larger options of a new TV era. 

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