The five finalists in this year’s MIPFormats Pitch competition finalists have been announced. They will be invited to Cannes to pitch their projects during the 3rd edition of MIPFormats, running on Friday 30 and Saturday 31 March 2012, ahead of MIPTV 2012 (Sunday 1 – Wednesday 4 April).
The MIPFormats Pitch competition is an international event for finding companies with innovative concepts for new, non-scripted entertainment formats. Warner Bros. International Television Production, the exclusive sponsor of the competition, oversaw the pre-selection and will spend up to euro 25,000 to develop the winning project of the MIPFormats Pitch.
Formats remain a very lucrative part of the business, even though it sometimes feels as though Endemol have a monopoly on the really successful ones.
Simon Staffans, Media City Finland
5 format finalists at MIPFormat Cannes
This year’s 5 finalists are:
ALL FOR ONE ONE FOR ALL Presented by Janane Mallat, CEO, IPROD, Lebanon
LOOKING FOR LOVE Presented by Stuart Coxe, Executive Producer, Antica Productions, Canada
MILLION DOLLAR MYSTERY Presented by Adam Markowitz, President, Markowitz Media, USA
PERSUASION Presented by Soreyrith Um, President, Summertime Entertainment, USA
WHICH ONE OUT Presented by Simon Staffans, Format Developer, MediaCity Finland, Finland
5 golden rules for pitching at Cannes
It’s interesting to see such a geographical spread of contestants, including at least one MIPTV regular, Simon Staffans (photo). Ironically, he has written five golden tips for successfully pitching a project that you (and his competitors) can find here (the link is now dead – sorry! Find Staffans podcast here). As many people have to pitch at Cannes events it makes interesting reading.