Kanal D to distribute drama series in LatAm

Turkish broadcaster Kanal D has its eye on Latin America as it plans to bring its drama series to the region. Kanal D is frequently ranked as the number one free-to-air broadcaster in Turkey and is a clear leader among its competitors in terms of ratings. There are several reasons behind the success the company's had in the last couple of years, with its production abilities clearly at the top of the list. The broadcaster produces several projects in-house, while a significant amount of content is managed by independent local production companies. Between 2011 and 2012, Kanal D produced three TV shows and three drama series in-house, along with three TV shows and 10 drama series it outsourced to other production companies. Kanal D's catalogue includes comedy, crime, documentaries and health genres but its drama is the most popular genre among international buyers. "Our TV content is distributed to the Middle East, Central Europe, North Africa, South Africa and Central Asia, and our goal is to reach Southeast Asia and Latin America," a company spokesperson said. The habit of watching TV series in Turkey started with Latin American telenovelas. However, hit titles from big companies such as Globo and Televisa have now been replaced by local productions. Nowadays, Turkish companies seem to be ready for payback, but Latin America has plenty of local content and it's not an easy market to distribute content in. "We are aware that competition is much tougher for Turkish drama series in Latin America, but we believe that our content is at least as good as Latin American TV series in terms of production, story, cast, etc. Latin America is a huge market and we believe that our TV series would be successful there as well," said a Kanal D executive.