MEDIA Plus offers UK Indie support

MEDIA Plus, the EU’s new support programme for the audiovisual industry across Europe, has strengthened its support mechanisms to secure development time and enhance the bargaining power of the independent producer.
At best, MEDIA Plus now offers grants as opposed to loans for the majority of its schemes and expects to develop long-term relationships with selected applicants by providing rolling credit lines through re-investment.
Across the UK, over 70% of applications submitted for MEDIA’s development scheme in 2001 were successful, with close to 50% of those applications being for Slate Funding. All companies selected for Slate Funding under previous development schemes successfully received a second tranche of funding. The UK is now second, after France, in the volume of investment made by MEDIA into a national industry.
The results point to a successful year, both in terms of the increased involvement of an industry in strengthening their investment in development and in terms of UK companies taking advantage of the availability of funds provided by MEDIA Plus. The 2002 round of development funding is presently being assessed and initial analysis of early applications show an equal, if not better, margin for success.
Alternatively, new support mechanisms for production have been introduced by MEDIA Plus for Television production (TV Broadcasting) and, in general, support towards the costs of financing film and television projects (Growth and Audiovisual: i2i Audiovisual). Both these schemes are open at present. TV Broadcasting offers 12.5% of your production budget (20% for documentaries) to a cap of 500,000 Euro if you have at least two European broadcasters attached. TV Broadcasting insists on limited licensing terms that offer rights reversion to the producer. Growth and Audiovisual offers up to 50,000 Euro against the cost of insurance premiums, completion guarantees, and some financing costs in order to assist independent producers close deals with banks and financial institutions offering discount loans.
(GB)