‘Babylon Berlin’ Outfit Beta Film Launches Nordic Studio With Acquisition Of Finland’s Fisher King

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Beta Film, the German producer and distributor of TV and film, has formed Sweden-based Beta Nordic Studios (BNS), which will act as an umbrella group for the company’s production activities in Scandinavia.

The move comes in the wake of Beta taking a majority stake in Finnish film and TV production outfit Fisher King, which has credits including the crime drama series Bordertown and fantasy drama series Nymphs, both of which originated in Finland but attracted international finance and were sold to international territories. Matti Halonen and Miikko Oikkonen founded the Helsinki-based company in 2013.

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Also in the BNS group is Dramacorp, the joint venture set up in 2016 by veteran Swedish-French drama executive Patrick Nebout and Beta CEO Jan Mojto, which has Swedish series Agent Hamilton coming up – the show celebrated its premiere at Mipcom this week and a second series has been given the green light for production in 2020.

Martin Håkansson, a former executive at Lagadère Sports and Nice Entertainment Group, has been appointed as CEO of BNS and will serve as director alongside Beta Film’s EVP Justus Riesenkampff.

BNS will focus on local-language scripted projects with international breakout potential and the company will look to utilize Beta Film’s international distribution network.

“Despite a period of intense consolidation, there are still opportunities in the Nordic market. Crucially, however, this is not an M&A strip-and-sell mission — in fact, it is the very opposite,” commented Håkansson. “Our mission is to combine the Nordic genius for production with Beta Film’s production experience and distribution power to create a joint venture that will deliver great, BNS-branded entertainment for years to come.”

Beta Film is in Mipcom this week with the third season of hit series Babylon Berlin, which we launched the first trailer for last week.

Beta also expanded its Spanish operation at the end of last month by linking up with Madrid-based Mono Producciones on a non-fiction label.

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