EXCLUSIVE: One of the market’s biggest-budget projects, the Will Smith action-crime thriller Sugar Bandits, has sealed multi-million dollar deals across the world for AGC ahead of a planned September start date.
08.05.2024 - 13:47 / deadline.com
European production and sales studio Vuelta Group has bought German producer Telepool from Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith’s Westbrook.
The deal, struck through Vuelta subsidiary SquareOne, will see a combined business operating under the SquareOne banner. SquareOne and Vuelta Group Germany CEO Al Munteanu will lead the banner, with Michael Heyd serving as CFO and COO.
Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but the combined group will boast a library of over 1,200 titles such as Drive, Intouchables, Olympus Has Fallen, Transporter 3 and the recently released One Life. It will form part of the growing Vuelta Group, which in July last year we revealed had formed through the acquisitions of SquareOne, Paris-based international sales firm Playtime Group and Nordic distributor-producer Scanbox.
Vuelta Group Chairman Jeromt Levy, who launched the group with $50M backing from an unnamed U.S. private equity firm, announced the news today along with Munteanu.
“For over 60 years, Telepool has been one of the leading global content houses and we are proud of the work we did with the company, said Westbrook CEO Kosaku Yada. “We are grateful to Yoko Higuchi-Zitzmann for her leadership over the past two years. Her respect from the creative community has been instrumental in Telepool’s success.”
“The new and expanded company will be active across distribution and production,” said Munteanu. “The combined entity enables SquareOne to offer German-speaking audiences a strong and varied slate of theatrical releases going forward, across multiple genres — from ‘smarthouse’, comedies, and actioners to high-end family entertainment: The Last Breath, Lords of War, Hellboy, Broker Homefront 2, and Bambi being the first out of the
EXCLUSIVE: One of the market’s biggest-budget projects, the Will Smith action-crime thriller Sugar Bandits, has sealed multi-million dollar deals across the world for AGC ahead of a planned September start date.
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SquareOne Entertainment, part of rising European film studio Vuelta Group, has acquired German film and TV production, distribution and licensing company Telepool, which was owned by Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith’s Westbrook. The news was announced Wednesday by Vuelta Group chairman Jerome Levy and CEO of SquareOne and Vuelta Group Germany Al Munteanu.