Executives from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have highlighted the Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) restrictions, suggesting that local production costs have risen, accidentally supporting US streamers and failing to improve programming diversity in small markets.
Discussions about the future of AVMSD have won centre stage at events across Europe over the last few months. Players in the continent’s television and film industry have spoken out about the highly influential EU directive that is due to be reviewed next year.
Translated by numerous governments across Europe, AVMSD allows countries to force US streamers to 30% of their European jobs, and member states can also implement their own financial obligations on streamers to invest in local content.
US President Donald Trump opposed EU regulations earlier this year and called on the European industry to “unify” by series enthusiasts French National Film Centre (CNC), but executives at an event in the television industry claim that AVMSD needs will be revised.
Chris Marcić, CEO of Croatia Audiovisual Centre (HAVC) and chairman of the European Film Directors Association (EFAD), said AVMSD was “helpful,” but added that there is a “scope” for improvement, particularly with cultural diversity.
“There are loopholes in the command. One of them is that the idea of cultural diversity, which appears to be a concept that applies to Europe and all member states, is not actually the case. Let’s face it.”
European industry analyst Christian Grece outlined the disproportionate spending of streamers in larger markets, and Marcić admitted that small countries such as Croatia saw “lol profits” from the directive in terms of investment.
Marcich praised Netflix for getting a limited amount of local programming and making it visible to subscribers, but when referring to Croatia, he emphasized that other major US players “didn’t do anything for us.”
Vanda Rapti, vice president of content distribution for Viaplay Select and Viaplay Group, noted that Streamers can meet quotas “just buy lots of UK or French content.”
“It doesn’t reflect the diversity of Europe. Unfortunately, it’s something we haven’t seen yet.”
Rapti meant that the quota meant that streamers had to be “more relevant and in a way” to European audiences, but suggested that many people invested in the original content in the region, regardless of regulations.
Branko-Cakarmiš, a strategic advisor to CME-owned pop television, opposed the allocation of AVMSDs, saying the future of the industry should be left to the creative ability to seduce viewers.
“Quotas are stupid in general, especially for people in the creative world,” he said. “The directive had zero impact on small and medium-sized markets in Central Europe.
“Companies need to move where their audience is and there is a natural transition from broadcast to streaming, but the directive is not helping that direction.
“In fact, it hurts us because while we push our big competitors to put money into European work, it’s part of our identity (lost).
“Americans can always raise the budget for the series and it can automatically increase the costs of local players, so our costs are also increasing. That’s stupid and I’m being honest.”
Chakalmish added that more thought should be made for the use of public funds in regards to tax incentives to seduce non-regional production.
“We are giving this incentive to American productions in our territory for our production services. It brings the best people from our market to American products and it’s back to their platform. That makes no sense.”
The opposite of streamers
AVMSD reviews are scheduled for next year, but some US streamers are also beginning to oppose the directive.
Last August, Netflix filed an appeal with the Belgian Constitutional Court, protesting the law, which would increase by up to 9.5% for streamers in the country’s French-speaking Walonia-Brussels region.
Disney then joined the incident as a stakeholder in November, taking on even more important cases following President Donald Trump’s tariff war. While streamers want to make large investments in European content a trumpet, they see this case as a challenge to AVMSD.
On Tuesday, Netflix’s top executive Ted Sarandos appeared in Madrid along with Spanish President Pedro Sanchez, speaking of 1 billion euros (£850 million) investment over the next four years, while former Movistar Plus+ International and Sony Exec Maria Valenzuela highlighted the impact of streamer investment in the broader industries of their home country.
“They create a lot of industry infrastructure. There’s a lot of money invested in production, and you get the spread of content and it’s reflected in the world.”
Valenzuela, now a producer, added that in recent years the influx of productions into Spain has caused an inflationary effect.
“I’ve been on the local platform side of the business and have seen the budget have an inflation problem… Inflation means that players come to the territory to produce, and that means we’ve done a much more difficult job when it comes to manufacturing our content.
This article was first published by Screen’s sister title broadcast
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