Distributor DRG has struck a partnership deal with Wildseed Studios, the content and talent incubation company founded by Miles Bullough and Jesse Cleverly.
Wildseed Studios was launched in 2013 to find new content creators and pilot original ideas specifically designed to work across the growing number of digital services.
The business is focused on finding scripted content with characters that appeal to millennial audiences, with comedy, genre fiction and kids 6-11 being key areas of focus.
Typically, Wildseed Studios looks to make initial investments of up to £10,000 in an idea or creator with potential. Since opening its submissions portal in 2014, Wildseed says it has received more than 3000 project proposals, has picked up 30, published 20. Wildseed adds that it has had a 60 per cent pickup rate from premium platform partners.
The new partnership sees DRG providing funding for a fresh round of new pilots in Q1 2017.
DRG will also become the distributor for Wildseed’s content.
“We are constantly looking for exciting opportunities that both provide us with a new pipeline of content and that encourage us to look at different ways of working in our changing world”, said Richard Halliwell, DRG’s managing director.
“Our new relationship with Wildseed is ripping up the ‘distributor rulebook’; we are investing in creators with no ‘mainstream’ experience and no access to market – who are amazingly talented and just need some seed investment to gain momentum. DRG is evolving to become more inventive and creative, and less risk-adverse, in order to take full advantage of the fast-moving developments in the digital space. Miles and Jesse are pioneers in this evolving business and we are fascinated to be a part of the ride and see where this joint journey takes us both.”
Bullough from Wildseed Studios comments: “We felt the time was right to go up a gear and this partnership with DRG is effectively allowing us to launch phase two of our business, and to reload the Wildseed incubator – wild.sd/submissions. Not only do we have extra investment, but also DRG’s team of experts at our disposal, who will help us meet new buyers and platforms and share developments in the international marketplace.
Wildseed Studio’s incubator successes include the 2016 Children’s BAFTA-winning short Good as Goaled/Lottie Bearshout, made for Disney XD, the Children’s BAFTA-nominated Counterfeit Cat, also for Disney XD and Teletoon Canada, Tales of the Serengeti an anarchic animation made for BBC3, Wolf Jenkins, an 8 bit animated comedy also for BBC3, an unnamed pilot for Channel 4 from creator of Wildseed pilot Shambles and Philip Human, a horror web series picked up by Fullscreen, the US SVOD service.
Staff Reporter
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