Televisa takes Wills for content

Mexican media giant Televisa has strengthened its ties with US-based Hispanic broadcaster Univision by appointing one of the latter’s execs to oversee its newly enlarged studio operations.

Patricio Wills

Patricio Wills becomes president and head of Televisa Estudios, which will encompass all of the Mexican company’s productions apart from news and sports.

He will report to Isaac Lee, who was named chief content officer of Univision and Televisa in 2017 after the companies merged their production arms.

Wills, who is also president of Univision-backed prodco W Studios, will oversee Televisa’s content strategy will be responsible for the development and production of programming for its pay and free-to-air operations.

His credits include Spanish shows such as La Piloto, while he has also worked on numerous shows for Univision and Televisa, including La Bella y las Bestias.

He replaces Rosy Ocampo, Televisa’s corporate VP of content, who will now move to an unspecified content production role for the Mexican broadcaster, which holds a stake of around 40% in Univision.

Televisa merged its development and production arms with Univision in early 2017, with Lee overseeing content in addition to his programming role at Univision and English-language sibling network Fusion.

At the time of the deal, Univision and Televisa said their combined audience would be around 175 million viewers, with aggregate purchasing power of close to US$2tn.

Univision is a state of flux at present as its seeks to replace CEO Randy Falco, who revealed his desire to step down from his role over the coming year. The broadcaster’s long-held plans to float on the stock exchange have also been cancelled, prompting a review of its business strategy.