Montreal: Rumblings in the production sector and among investors point to new acquisition interest in Montreal animation producer Cine-Groupe.

Potential buyers casing Cine-Groupe’s library and its current production slate, worth as estimated $40 million to $50 million over the next two years, include Productions La Fete, which is 20% owned by Alliance Communications. Cine-Groupe has close to 400 half-hours in its library, among them Euro-favorites Spirou and Ovide and the Gang, a 10-year-old critically acclaimed series which has just been renewed for five years by Radio-Canada here at home.

Cine-Groupe president and ceo Jacques Pettigrew says offers have been filed by companies in both Canada and in the u.s. ‘But all the offers that have been filed have been refused.’ La Fete president Rock Demers confirms La Fete’s original bid was rejected but says there is still interest in the company.

Current contracted production at Cine-Groupe includes Princess Sissi, 52 half-hours for Radio-Canada; Ragamuffin, 25 15 minutes coproduced with Cambium of Toronto for cbc/Radio-Canada and Saban International of Paris, France 3, rai in Italy and ard in Germany; a series of five-minute animated inserts for the Telescene/Fox sitcom Student Bodies; 26 half-hours of The Adventures of Father Christmas, with financing from France 3, Marathon Productions, Super Ecran and Tele-Quebec; 26 half-hours of Team s.o.s., with Tele-Quebec, France 2 and Ravensburger on board; and Jim Bouton, a new 52 half-hour preschool fantasy children’s series from the author of The Neverending Story in coproduction with Saban, with presales to TF1 and Radio-Canada.

Cine-Groupe also produced a pilot in ’96 for Link, a new half-hour sitcom series with financing from Beta Taurus in Germany and Teleimages in France. The pilot quickly pulled in a couple of prestigious European festival awards. ‘Now everybody wants it [Link]. If I told you the price we sold it to Germany you’d fall off your chair,’ says Pettigrew.

Cine-Groupe is also prepping for a fall startup on Heavy Metal 2, a $15 million feature sequel, with Columbia TriStar slated to distribute.

Cine-Groupe has its own cel, 2D and 3D animation studios and currently employs 225.

Cinepix Film Properties has had majority control of the company since 1994, with about 50% of the shares. Pettigrew also holds shares.

Earlier, cfp president Andre Link told Playback cfp is looking closely at an ipo in ’97. An ipo issue has yet to happen but new capitalization developments at cfp may be in the works.