Sphere Abacus presents the David Suchet series “Gunpowder Drama” at MIPCOM

EXCLUSIVE: Sphere Abacus heads to the inaugural MIPCOM next week with some head-turning titles, looking to make a splash in a crowded market.

The newly formed company was formed this summer when Canadian company Sphere Media signed a 24.6 million Canadian dollar ($18.2 million) deal for U.K.-based Abacus Media Rights, the U.K.-based distributor. completed Leave Neverland And Bushland. Before heading to Cannes – with legendary Poirot actor David Suchet at the party – CEO Jonathan Ford and Sphere Media CEO Bruno Dubé spoke to Deadline.

Abacus was only founded in 2020, but when the opportunity arose, Ford saw a chance to step on the accelerator with the Sphere deal. “We are the eighth largest UK distributor, but there is a big gap between us and the seventh,” he says. “We didn’t own any manufacturing companies, we didn’t own any intellectual property, and to bridge that gap the best move was to become part of a larger group.”

Dubé explains the reasons from Sphere’s perspective: “The acquisition of Abacus not only gives us access to a larger number of potential partners for the creation and production of high-quality content, but also access to a wonderful team for pre-sales and content exploitation.”

Notably, Sphere’s sales division has been dwarfed compared to the Abacus business, meaning the acquisition is additive and creates no overlap.

David Suchet travels to Cannes

Sphere Abacus will be accompanied at MIPCOM by David Suchet. The legendary Poirot The actor will be in the city for promotions Traveling with Agatha Christie with Sir David Suchet. Abacus helped bring together funding for the show between Soho Studios and Two Rivers Media, with Channel 4 in the UK, Britbox in North America and the Nordics and SBS in Australia all on board and Sphere Abacus now selling other territories.

The series is a good example of how a distributor can make a project a success through clever advance sales or the involvement of co-production partners. Budgets and costs have increased, but licensing fees are still low, making a well-connected and flexible distributor a valuable ally.

Ford says, “Sometimes a distribution advance alone isn’t enough to finance a show. So we need to have relationships in the market that allow us to deal with pre-pre-sales and co-pros and combine the two if necessary, and have that ability. “Moving quickly is what independent producers want.”

Other new shows Sphere Abacus has on its first-ever MIPCOM slate include: Gunpowder siegethe lightbox (Whitney)-produced historical drama starring Chuku Modu. There is also a cat and mouse drama See you later [working title] with Jason Watkins and Robson Greene. The factual list includes Wasp Woman: Murder of a Cult Movie QueenEmbankment’s Sundance Now series about the murder of B-movie actress Susan Cabot. There are also BBC and CNN documents Breaking Bird: The Rise and Fall of Twitter.

Sphere is backed by Bell Media, the Canadian giant led by Sean Cohan, who told Deadline last year about its plans to expand the distribution arm of the business. Since Bell also has specialty channels, there are several ways to work with Sphere Abacus.

“It’s great that we have the same interest in expanding our international presence,” says Dubé, adding that Sphere Abacus’ growth plan also includes making new friends. “We will be able to increase our collaboration with new creative and production partners, allowing us to produce a greater volume of work that has impact and that we can be proud of as a team.”

With the giant distributor-producer groups getting bigger – Banijay snaps up libraries, All3Media has a rich new owner – and the Hollywood studios are back in the TV sales business, where does Sphere Abacus sit in the pecking order?

“Good content and good teams create good projects and opportunities,” says Dubé. “I dare to believe that we can compete with the best in our industry in terms of high quality, reputation and awareness.”

Ford says Abacus grew in a very difficult market in 2023 and 2024, and he sees green shoots heading into 2025.

“In five years, we want our business to be three to four times larger in terms of revenue streams. If we build on the production business we’re part of now, build on the relationship with Bell Media, and continue to expand what we were already doing and invest in programming, we’ll get there.”