Montreal: Telefilm Canada has reorganized its production and development branch into a streamlined operations branch with integrated core business units managing features and television projects in each of its principal Canadian offices.

Each core unit – likely two per city, one for features, one for tv – includes a head, a distribution person, a lawyer, a business affairs person, a creative affairs resource person and a contract management or recoupment person. Multimedia will probably be integrated into the feature film unit, says Peter Katadotis, Telefilm’s national operations director.

‘It’s integrated because all those people who used to be in other services are now in the core business units and answerable to one person,’ he says.

Katadotis says the reorganization creates ‘a one-stop wicket’ for producers and distributors dealing with the federal funding agency.

‘Each of the units will have a recoupment objective and will have to return a certain amount to the corporation every year,’ he says, adding that the unit’s contract manager will review deals and monitor a production’s recoupment record.

Katadotis says the core business units will establish a new ‘standard of service,’ in other words, a reduced time frame in which to evaluate projects and give an answer.

The multimedia fund is in the advanced planning stage, with a hoped-for startup in ’95. The fund will probably be less than $500,000.

Katadotis says the units should be up and running before the end of the year. LRB