Chris Dziadul previews Discop 07
Next week will see Discop 07 take place in the Hungarian capital, Budapest. The largest and longest established annual formats and content market in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), it will – as in previous years – include a number of special events.
One undoubted highlight is likely to be Discopro, a conference providing an overview of subsidies, grants, tax benefits, private loans and other TV content co-production incentives available in CEE. Its timeliness is quite apparent, given the recent two enlargements of the EU into the region, proposed entry of more states into the Union, revision of the Television without Frontiers directive and growth in the number of pan-European co-production deals involving CEE partners.
Discopro will take place over a whole morning on Tuesday, June 19 and be followed by afternoon networking and a workshop. Among the subjects to be discussed in the conference will be creative partnerships between CEE TV stations, local producers, advertisers and TV formats licensors, along with private funding/revolving credit available for co-production projects involving CEE partners. Guest speakers at a session being presented by Broadband TV News will include Oscar Hoglund (Zodiak), Peter Kolosi (RTL Klub, Hungary), Alex Kutela (HBO Central Europe) and Tim Horan (ITI Group Poland).
Another conference at Discop 07 will meanwhile take place two days later (June 21) and have as its subject The Power of Late Night Television. Its focus will be on such areas as added value for advertisers and direct-response marketers and late night TV audiences and their mobile phones.
The Discop market itself already has over 1,500 registered participants and will be a must-attend event for all those interested in the programming sector in Central and Eastern Europe. Organised by the Paris-based company Basic Lead, it also has the backing of the US’s NATPE and is arguably the nearest thing in CEE to the latter’s annual conference and exhibition in Las Vegas.
