Ahead of Mipcom 2021, Mirka Savic Pinhas, Head of Formats & Acquisitions at Acun Medya Global, spoke to TTV+ about the content she’s looking for in the international market.

TTVMedia, through its TTV+ platform and backed by Eccho Rights, presents its Buyers: What Are They Looking For? initiative to find out more about international buyers’ programming needs.

The interviews were conducted through the base of over 5,000 buyers registered on TTV+, a 24/7 online marketplace where buyers can look through catalogs from thousands of companies, and in which distributors can contact them to close businesses.

This time, we present Mirka Savic Pinhas, Head of Formats & Acquisitions at Acun Medya Global.

What type of content are you looking for?

The position of Acun Medya Global is slightly different and unique because we work with multiple territories including Turkey, Greece, Mexico, US Hispanic, Hungary and Romania, so we have a wider range and area, especially in my area which is non-scripted formats.

We mainly rely on entertainment formats, specifically prime time entertainment formats is what we usually look for. But we also look for fiction because we have a new OTT platform called Exxen than we launched in January in Turkey also going global.

What type of stories are you looking for?

There are two main elements when we look at stories or ideas. One is an ingredient that makes the format unique. The turning chairs on The Voice or the intense reality that Survivor has, or Exatlon amazing parkours. These types of special elements of a format that makes it very important for us.

The other is the twists and tricks that apply to the formats we look for. A good idea, then how it’s been threaded across the series in a format is what makes it special. The uniqueness in the ideas is what we look for.

Any specific format or production that may have caught your attention over the last year?

Despite the pandemic, there are a lot of developments in regard to game shows, specifically comedy shows that caught our attention and new reality shows that are very promising. I think those types of formats caught our attention. And also Turkish dramas like Kirmizi Oda that broadcast on our channel TV8, that’s good adaptations of writers and books.

Is there any specific format that worked especially well in your screen?

We do big brands and we’ve been doing it for a very long time and they usually work, like The Voice, Survivor, Exatlon or MasterChef. We all produce these big formats in a global sense. But yet again, not only new formats take our attention, but also applying new versions of big brands is exciting. Like The Voice wrapped, we produced for the first time globally for the OTT platform and it was also a big success.