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NENT ups Halliwell to replace Andersen

Richard Halliwell has been promoted to CEO of the UK arm of Nordic Entertainment Group (NENT), replacing Jakob Mejlhede Andersen who left in February.

Richard Halliwell

Halliwell is currently CEO of NENT-owned UK distributor DRG and MD of NENT Studios UK. As part of his promotion, DRG will now be incorporated into NENT Studios UK and rebranded under the same banner.

Andersen subsequently resurfaced in March as chief content officer at Middle Eastern VoD player Shahid.

NENT Studios UK was launched in September 2019 as part of NENT Group’s content creation, production and distribution business, which comprises 32 companies in 17 countries. It is focused on the development, funding, production and distribution of both scripted and unscripted content.

The company said in a statement today it will make investments in the UK and internationally, in order to deliver content for NENT Group’s Nordic streaming service Viaplay, and will partner with other media companies, broadcasters and platforms around the world to do so.

NENT Studios UK will work with new production partners, as well as the independent producers with whom DRG already has long-standing relationships and will be run from DRG’s offices in central London.

DRG was established as a conventional distributor of scripted, unscripted and formats in 2007 and has evolved into a business that is involved in programme origination and development, financing, talent, production, production services and distribution.

It has a catalogue of more than 13,000 hours of programming and 150 formats, including Doc Martin, which it has taken into more than 100 territories with seven international remakes, and competitive reality format The Farm.

Halliwell said: “NENT Group has a long-term commitment to the UK, which is a truly global content centre. Bringing DRG fully into NENT Studios UK will create fantastic new opportunities, both for the team and for our current and future partners.

“We have a number of exciting projects in advanced development and anticipate being able to announce our first scripted commission in the next few weeks.”

The move comes amidst a wider reorganisation of NENT Group’s business. The company said today it was restarting the process of offloading its unscripted, branded entertainment and events business, which had been on hold due to the coronavirus crisis.

It is also in discussions with potential partners to invest in the accelerated development of its scripted output.

The new and scripted-focused production business will comprise NENT Studios’ Nordic production companies Brain Academy Nordics, Nice Drama and EPIQ; its Budapest-based prodco Paprika; NENT Studios’ UK operations and the group’s joint venture with FilmNation Entertainment; its US-based scripted production company Brain Academy US; and NENT Group’s investment in Los Angeles studio Picturestart.

NENT Studios’ unscripted production, branded entertainment and events companies primarily work with external clients and comprise Strix, Baluba, Monster, Novemberfilm, Moskito, Rakett, Strong Productions and Production House; Splay One; Playroom, One Big Happy Family and Grillifilms, respectively.

ACF is working as financial adviser for the sale of the non-scripted production and events companies, and with Stella EOC for the sale of branded entertainment business Splay One.

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