PIKE CONFERENCE – SOPOT. HBO plans to increase the amount of local content it produces in Poland. However, it will have to reinforce the values the company has and strengthen its brand.
Commenting on HBO’s activities in the country, HBO Polska president and senior VP, HBO Central Europe Aleksander Kutela said that the company began producing a series in Poland a few weeks ago and would like to make a maximum of one or two a year. It has already been making documentaries in the country for some time.
Asked whether the series would be Polish productions of international formats or original Polish productions, he said both.
Dorota Zurkowska-Bytner, VP ad sales, Discovery Networks Central Europe, meanwhile said that the company already has a strong emphasis on local content.
Discovery Historia, for instance, is aimed solely at the Polish market and 40% of its programming is locally produced. Furthermore, TLC will start showing Polish programming from next year.
Both Kutela and Zurkowska-Bytner were answering to criticism from Jaroslaw Pijanowski, director of sales and marketing and a member of the board at UPC.
He said one of the main problems the operator is currently facing is a lack of content produced specifically for the Polish market.
