Red Arrow buys Gravitas

Germany’s Red Arrow Entertainment Group has taken a majority stake in US film distributor Gravitas Ventures, with an eye on pairing for movie and TV projects.

Henrik Pabst

The deal will see Red Arrow International, the company’s global TV distribution and production arm, and Gravitas make significant investments in global film and TV projects through acquisitions, coproductions and co-financing.

LA-based Gravitas launched in 2006 and has a particular focus on independently produced films and documentaries for sale to global digital, SVoD and OTT platforms. It releases more than 400 new films annually and has a library of 2,400-plus English-language titles.

The company has developed relationships with more than 200 VoD, SVoD and electronic sell-through firms including Amazon, Apple, Google, Hulu, Netflix, Showtime and Starz.

All Gravitas Ventures employees will be retained following the transaction, with Nolan Gallagher, Michael Murphy and Brendan Gallagher remaining minority owners and continuing to run the business with long-term employment contracts.

Jan Frouman

Both Gravitas and Red Arrow International, led by Henrik Pabst, will continue to operate as independent Red Arrow businesses but will be closely aligned to achieve strategic synergies.

Red Arrow said the deal would “dramatically expand the group’s distribution scale, coproduction and co-financing capacity, catalogue breadth and overall presence in the US creative market.”

Jan Frouman, chairman and CEO of Red Arrow Entertainment, said: “International distribution has been essential to our success from day one. In the future, scale in this space will become increasingly important.

“Partnering together, we will have tremendous capabilities to package and sell films and TV to the growing list of buyers worldwide.”

The addition of Gravitas means Red Arrow Entertainment Group has now invested in 11 companies located in the US, with prodcos 44 Blue Productions, Kinetic Content, Fabrik Entertainment, Left/Right, Half Yard Productions, Karga Seven Pictures, Dorsey Pictures, Ripple Entertainment, 10Fold and Band of Outsiders all in its portfolio.

Salem Partners and Greenberg Glusker advised Gravitas Ventures on the deal, while Red Arrow was advised by Stella EOC and Milbank.