Canada lit up the Croisette while FAST (free, ad-supported streaming TV) channels and streamer alliances were among the trends generating buzz at this year’s MIPCOM.

With the dust now settled on last week’s 38th international coproduction and entertainment content market, Playback Daily asked Canadian delegates their thoughts on the trade show’s return to in-person events after pandemic-forced virtual instalments.

“The market was busy, and Canada was all the buzz,” says Mark Bishop, co-CEO and executive producer at marblemedia. “We were seeing lots of interest in working with Canada and excitement for more original formats coming from Canada.”

Canada had a record-high presence with more than 90 homegrown companies at the Canada Pavilion, which was set in a more prominent and sunny Riviera stand (pictured) overlooking the water in Cannes, France compared to its usual basement spot. Meanwhile, three Canadian shows won at the MIPCOM Cannes Diversify TV Awards: CBC and HBO Max dramedy Sort Of, Radio-Canada’s Pour toi Flora (Dear Flora) and CBC’s Proud To Be Me.

MIPCOM director Lucy Smith told press on the second-last day of the trade show (Oct. 19) that the event surpassed its estimated 10,000 delegates, hitting around 11,000. It also surpassed its estimated 100 attending countries, coming in at 108. That included 3,100 buyers, with the biggest numbers hailing from the U.S., followed by the U.K., France, Germany and Spain.

An emerging trend at the market “was more international buyers getting into development,” says Bishop. “marblemedia has two deals in the works coming out of the market as a result of being in person and meeting face-to-face to pitch and listen to partner needs.”

Another trend was how “the economics of premium content in the streaming world is bringing together interesting partnerships, and the opportunity for global streaming brands to work together on projects,” he adds, noting FAST channels were also “all the talk and expanding internationally.”

OUTtv Network CEO Brad Danks agrees: “The most important trend of 2022 is the explosion of the FAST (free ad-supported) services.”

“Channel distributors like Tubi, Pluto TV and Samsung Plus were prominent at this market, as were content aggregators like FilmRise and Cinedigm. Even the FAST technology providers like Wurl and Amagi had booths, which was new,” he says. “Clearly this distribution trend will continue into 2023 and beyond.”

OUTtv’s MIPCOM focus was on distribution deals, primarily in the FAST space, Europe and Africa for SVOD. “It was a very successful market for us in regards to global expansion,” Danks says.

Aldo Di Felice, president of TLN Media Group, echoes the observations about the FAST chatter and says he and his team were “surprised by the abundance of content acquisition opportunities at this MIPCOM.”

“Our team discovered and secured a number of ‘must-watch’ special event programs; announcements will follow in January,” says Di Felice. “Most interesting to me were specialized, niche premium content streamers seeking alliances.”

Carl Hall, managing director of West One International, was at the market as a consultant on the newly established Underknown Studios team. He says the response to their primary series What If was “overwhelming — across the U.S., Europe, the U.K. and Asia” — all markets in which they have built-in audiences.

Hall says he found many market buyers “looking for high-quality, long-running new series to stock up their broadcasters’ depleted inventories.”

“Distributors will be working harder to make more sales to make up production budgets,” he adds. “But these sales need to be far more strategic with rights like AVOD carefully managed to maximize revenues.”