Secuoya Studios remains rooted in creativity
Secuoya Studios is accelerating its global expansion with big-budget productions, plans to enter the UK market and a bold move into English-language content production.
Raúl Berdonés
In 2021, still in the midst of the pandemic, Secuoya Content Group announced the creation of Secuoya Studios, marking a bold new venture for the Spanish company in the creation and production of original content.
Until then, Secuoya was known across Spain and Latin America as a major production service company. It’s no coincidence Netflix chose its impressive Madrid Content City complex as its European production hub.
But the launch of Secuoya Studios signalled a new beginning for the company. “Three years ago, we defined a strategic shift to place content at the core of the company’s vision. Today, we’ve far exceeded the goals we set,” notes executive chairman Raúl Berdonés.
Zorro, an ambitious US$40m production based on the classic vigilante character and unveiled at last year’s Mipcom and coproduced with Amazon’s Prime Video and France’s Mediawan, is perhaps its most well-known project.
M6 in France, Mediaset in Italy, VTM in Flemish Belgium and RTL Klub in Hungary are among the broadcasters to have picked up the show, which is one of the most expensive Spanish-language series of all time.
But its production engine hasn’t slowed down since then, with a modern adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo sold to ViX and Movistar Plus+, as well as upcoming projects like psychological thriller Matices (Shades) for SkyShowtime, crime thriller Terra Alta for Movistar Plus+, historical series Los 39 (The 39) and La encrucijada, the Spanish adaptation of Turkish drama Brave & Beautiful for Atresmedia.
The company is also developing a prequel to Zorro, starring Ted Lasso’s Cristo Fernández, who appears as the swashbuckling hero in the first episode, but his character is killed off and Spanish actor Miguel Bernardeau then dons the mask and cape for the rest of the series. The origin story of Fernández’s Zorro will be told in the prequel series.
Psychological thriller Matices (Shades) will air on SkyShowtime
Fernández’s version of the character – real name Po-mahn-kwakurr – is indigenous and protects his people from oppression. The actor, who plays soccer star Dani Rojas in Ted Lasso, has said the Zorro prequel will double down on these themes.
In total, the studio has more than 20 projects in development, spanning series, telenovelas, films and unscripted content. According to its latest financial report, the group generated €106.2m (US$111.5m) in revenue in 2023, with the studios accounting for 45% of its Ebitda – a result attributed to its IP retention strategy.
The cornerstone of Secuoya Studios’ model is precisely the retention of IP through coproduction deals or risk-based investments, supported by its extensive infrastructure, which ranges from in-house creators to a fully equipped production hub at Madrid Content City.
“We have a mindset very much like the traditional studios in the US, where not only do we have all the talent and creative development in-house, but we also control all production-related aspects: our own sets, our own VFX studios, post-production facilities and business affairs teams. Everything is integrated within the studio,” explains Berdonés.
“What we’ve done, with a very cross-disciplinary approach, is control the entire value chain, which is a differentiating factor. We are a studio, and we produce for ourselves, then sell to the world.”
Filming underway on crime thriller Terra Alta for Movistar Plus+
According to Berdonés, the company is now working on projects with budgets totalling over US$60m, while also gearing up to begin producing in English – one of its key goals for the coming years.
“In three years, we want to be a globally recognised studio with a significant European presence. We envision a larger studio than we have today, doubling or even tripling in size. And we also see a greater balance between Spanish- and English-language content,” the exec says.
In fact, 40% of Secuoya Studios’ projects currrently in development are in English – a strategy that Berdonés believes will drive the company’s growth in both the UK and US.
“We’re seeking English-language projects that we can coproduce with the US. We want to develop them here, but with creators in LA or New York, where we are already working. Another key strategy will be establishing a strong presence in the UK in the coming months, one way or another.”
The first step in this expansion was restructuring its operation through a system of creative pods, where each executive producer leads a multidisciplinary team that also includes a head of development and a fiction coordinator.
The first three pods announced will be led by executive producers Mónica Aguirre, Juan Carballo, an Argentinian screenwriter and producer, and Sergio Cánovas, a Spanish showrunner and director.
Aguirre is the founder of Black Sheep Productions, a Miami-based production company that signed a first-look deal with Game of Thrones executive producer Vince Gerardis in 2022. Carballo has worked across Argentina, Mexico, Spain and the US, developing, writing and producing series for Amazon MGM Studios, Netflix, Star+, HBO and Paramount+. Cánovas, who started working with Secuoya on the series Matices, coproduced by his company Stellarmedia, will lead projects with international potential.
“We want to increase the relevance of our content at an international and global level,” said Brendan Fitzgerald, a former Sony Pictures Television executive who joined Secuoya earlier this year as CEO, referencing these partnerships.
“Normally, you would need time to achieve this, but our bosses haven’t given us that time. So we had to come up with a way to increase quality without reducing volume,” Fitzgerald joked during the recent Iberseries & Platino Industria event in Madrid when explaining the pod structure.
Fitzgerald also emphasised that the idea is to be “language-agnostic” in terms of production, with an initial move into English. “We’re going to open another pod in the UK, and we’re looking at other countries in Europe. But Spain, Latin America and the UK will be our three pillars,” he explained.
The company has already revealed its first English-language project to be produced in the UK, an as-yet-untitled action-packed psychological thriller set in London and overseen by Cánovas.
These deals add to the partnerships Secuoya Studios already had in place with companies including US-based Rubicon Global, led by former Starz CEO Chris Albrecht and Ugly Betty producer Jorge Granier; Colombian giant Caracol, to develop, finance and produce premium series; and with Cuban-American actor William Levy, to produce the series Arcadia and film Bajo un volcán alongside streaming platform ViX.
While Cánovas’ series will mark the group’s expansion into the UK, its US strategy focuses on creating content with Latino or Hispanic characters or themes, but produced in English.
“I believe there is a great opportunity to reach the US Hispanic market with content produced in English,” said Sergio Pizzolante, Secuoya Studios’ president of commercial and distribution, who was also speaking at Iberseries & Platino Industria.
“These need to be universal stories with a Latino element authentically woven into the narrative. That’s the next phase, or at least those are the projects we’re pursuing.”
More broadly, Fitzgerald explained that the studios he leads are primarily focused on “commercial and high-quality” content firmly in the mainstream.
“I don’t want to see anything dystopian or sad. We want to sell shows to platforms and networks – blue sky, thrillers, detective stories. Once we are selling four, five or six series a year, then we can start looking at things a bit more on the sidelines,” he said.
