New8 Extends ‘Successful’ Partnership for Another Three Years, Vows to Continue Supporting ‘European Potential’ 

The New8 – the production and broadcast collaboration between eight major European broadcasters to commission, produce and distribute original series – has been renewed for another three years. The renewal was announced during a panel on Wednesday at the Göteborg Film Festival‘s TV Drama Vision and emphasizes the success of the collaboration, which has already spawned 24 original series in several stages of development, production and release.  

The eight members of New8 are SVT (Sweden), DR (Denmark), YLE (Finland), RÚV (Iceland),  NRK (Norway), VRT (Flanders/Belgium), NPO (The Netherlands) and ZDF (Germany). That represents a potential market of 142 million, or more than twice the size of France.

Since it was first established towards the end of 2023, the New8 has solidified itself as a successful model for boosting European co-productions. Titles to come out of the partnership include “This Is Not a Murder Mystery,” “Kabul,” “Other People’s Money” and “Queen of Fucking Everything.” 

Speaking with Variety ahead of the renewal announcement, Elly Vervloet, international drama expert at VRT and chair of New8, highlighted how “important” the collaboration is. The exec also noted how, despite the deal nearing the end of its first three-year period, we are only just now beginning to see the fruits of its labor due to development and production timelines. Through the New8 deal, eight original series have been greenlit every year, totalling a whopping 24-title catalogue so far. 

“Producing a fiction series requires a longer time,” added Jasmin Maeda, SVP of international fiction, co-production and acquisition at ZDF. “For us, it was important to have this breeding ground and we were curious about the results. Now, with more experience, we want to take New8 to the next level. We want to work even closer together to bring European talents to international markets.”

NRK Head of International Financing Hans-Jørgen Osnes, responsible for first bringing the deal into fruition, praised the communication between heads of drama of all eight broadcasters. “We’re finding interesting projects and creating a trust-based relationship,” he added. “Also producers want to take part in this, which is extremely helpful, so that time can be spent on creating the content instead of chasing the money. Having time for developing and making the series is essential.”

Maeda echoes that thought, emphasizing how New8 becomes “even more of an opportunity” for creatives and producers at a time “when financing has become more difficult and complex, facing a lot of pressure in national and international markets.” “We platform European talent and give them stages in other countries. That’s the message we want to spread: we are helping European co-productions and talent to travel, and broadcasters are becoming even more connected on a strategic and production level.”

Asked about recently released data by the Ampere Analysis that points out 2028 as the inflection point when, globally, streamers will be spending more than the entire legacy broadcast business put together, Vervloet says she saw “the opposite” in the past. “If you look at what happened after 2022, which was the boom of the market followed by a collapse, what we saw in Europe was that global streamers’ commissions went down with 30%. On a global level, the average commissioning by the big streamers went down by 42%.” 

“We are a small territory in the northern part of Belgium, and what we experience is that global streamers are pulling back, producing a couple of blockbusters per year with less investment in our local market,” she added. “But we have different goals: as public broadcasters, our focus is, and has been for more than 70 years, to serve our local audience with strong, local and relevant content.”

When talking about what kind of series the New8 is looking for, the VRT exec brings out the concept of “European potential.” Prodded to expand on the idea, Vervloet adds qualifiers such as broad appeal, a focus on audiences between 18-45, cultural relevance and stories that are “bold and entertaining.” “If we can manage to meet those criteria, I’m convinced these shows will have European potential and beyond.”

As for the logistics of having eight major public broadcasters working together, Vervloet underlines how every broadcaster “can give editorial input into every aspect of the show at every stage of production,” including reading scripts and watching first draft cuts. To avoid having creatives deal with feedback from eight different sources, the New8 established that the local commissioner will always be the single point of contact for a production, a system that has proven effective during the first three-year term. 

Moving on, there will be one small difference in the process: the New8 has now created an extra round as participating members felt they “needed to discuss the content more and get to know each other and each other’s projects better.”

“We now work in two rounds,” clarified Vervloet. “[We host] content meetings in the first round where every broadcaster brings two or three series to the table and we ask questions like: which one would relate most to your audience and why? This way we can learn from each other while giving direct input. It’s very valuable feedback because you have seven other heads of drama from major broadcasters, people with strong knowledge and experience, and we take it all into account. This is a key difference compared to our first three years.”