Indie producer Portfolio Entertainment has bolstered its overseas distribution business by hiring veteran Louis Fournier to fill the new position of vice president of sales and acquisitions./p>

Joy Rosen and Lisa Olfman’s distribution arm Portfolio International is handling international sales on the cartoon series The Cat in the Hat Knows That!, already sold to Playhouse Disney channels in 40 territories and ITV in Britain.

Fournier points to Cat in the Hat as a “game changer” for Portfolio, with more to follow.

“I know I’m part of a process that’s going in a certain direction. I’m aware that creates a momentum,” he told Playback Daily.

Fournier, best known for marketing classic animation series like Arthur, Caillou, and Mona the Vampire at Montreal-based Cinar Corp., will be charged with expanding multiplatform content sales at Portfolio International.

“He (Fournier) is a key addition to our management team as Portfolio expands into new areas of growth in both the children’s and factual space,” Joy Rosen said in a statement.

Portfolio, which annually produces and distributes around $20 million worth of programming, got its start in 1991 when Olfman and Rosen launched the company in a spare bedroom with a borrowed typewriter and a $15,000 bank loan. The duo have been perennial players at international TV markets, selling a raft of factual, kids and lifestyle programming to international broadcasters, until Cat in the Hat came along.

“They were doing fine, but all of a sudden something happens. We will need to attract more properties like [Cat],” Fournier said.

With a new-look Portfolio up and running with a flourish in Fournier’s hire, look for more impact players to join the Toronto-based producer and distributor.

“I’m not the last hire they (Portfolio) will do,” Fournier ventured.

Aside from a brief stint as president of the youth and animation Unit at TVA International from 2000-2001, Fournier worked at Cinar between 1992 and 2004 when the Canadian producer was acquired by a consortium led by former Nelvana co-founder Michael Hirsh.

From 2005 to 2008, Fournier was president of Galakids, a division of Montreal-based indie producer Galafilm, and most recently he served as vice president of business development at interactive content producer Tribal Nova.

Portfolio International currently has a library of around 2,000 episodes of TV animation, factual and lifestyle programming.