MADRID -- In the late 1990s, Spain disembarked once more in Latin America. The new conquistadores were telcos, banks, oil companies and utility giants. Media followed in their wake.
But 2002 saw the conquista, like media congloms worldwide, partially retrench, yet still retain strong production and fiscal ties.
Little wonder: Much of Latin America was in political (Venezuela), social (Colombia), economic (Brazil) or all-round (Argentina) turmoil.
"The market has been somewhat decimated: There's been chronic devaluation in Argentina and Brazil; in Venezuela, we're looking at quasi-civil war; Uruguay went the way of Argentina. Universally, everybody has been hit very hard," says Maximilian Weiner, co-managing director of sales company CDC United Network. "Mexico has been holding up, but is anticipating the worst as well."
Top Spanish players also have caught a global cold. Faced by tumbling media stock values, they are managing existent businesses rather than plunging into further rounds of frenetic mergers and acquisitions.
The energies of Spain's two biggest TV companies -- Sogecable and Telefonica -- have been closely focused on attempting to close a merger of their pay TV platforms. Other initiatives have been put on hold, or advanced only cautiously.
One obvious example is Admira, the film and TV arm of Telefonica. It saw a boffo 2001, closing a joint-production deal with the Cisneros Group's Venevision Intl. to create telenovelas and other TV programming for Latin America and the U.S. Hispanic market.
In January 2002, Admira teamed with Disney to launch Latino pic production house Miravista, whose goal is to replicate the success of Argentina's Patagonik Film Group, in which Disney and Admira own stakes.
One movie has been shot: mainstream femme pic "Ladies Night," co-produced with Mexican indie Argos and Televisa. Miravista has a second pic at script stage. But that, for the moment, is that.
It's not all gloom, however. "In economic terms, Latin America certainly isn't comparable to Europe. But it's still an emerging economy," says Jose Maria Irisarri, who heads up international at the Arbol Group, the Spanish-speaking world's biggest indie TV production company.
"We're still betting firmly on territories where a local production industry can flourish, because that's where the growth is coming these days. Audiences want to see themselves reflected on TV. The success of series such as 'CSI' in Spain is an exception," Irisarri argues.
Wholly owned by the Arbol Group, Argentina's Promofilm has proved Arbol's main lever for opening up the Latin American market. Recent productions include reality show "Protagonistas de novela" for terrestrial broadcaster RCN in Colombia and Venezuela's Venevision, and variety show "Sala de parejas" for Colombia, Venezuela and the U.S.
Economic downturns have had some upside, encouraging Promofilm to offer its Argentine production services to other countries. One result has been "El conquistador del fin del mundo." Set in Patagonia, and entering production next month, the 14-part series is "a really important project for us," says Irisarri.
"It's an extreme adventure reality contest featuring competing teams from Argentina and the countries of its co-producers: Telemundo (U.S.), TV Azteca (Mexico), SBT (Brazil), Gamavision (Ecuador) and TV Nacional (Chile)," Irisarri says.
Each company will film its own version of a knockout race to the southern tip of Argentina. "That means we'll end up with locally skewed versions of a macroproduction," Irisarri adds.
Ele Juarez, a top exec at Telefonica Contenidos, Telefonica's content banner, sees some silver linings in Argentine film production.
"The box office of some (Argentine) films in Spain has aroused a lot of interest. There's a lot of talent in Argentina and production costs are a third of Spain's," says Juarez. "Pic production in Argentina will go up and up."
Despite sliding currency values, sales deals and co-production accords do continue in Latin America, often with U.S. panregional players or the biggest local companies.
Produce Plus, the TV production-distribution arm of Sogecable paybox Canal Plus Espana, has co-produced docus with Discovery Latin America.
"Thirty percent of our revenues come from Latin America and the Hispanic U.S.," says Produce Plus director Macarena Rey.
Produce has recently renewed an output deal with Mexico's Canal 22 for a stripped selection of Canal Plus Espana programming.
Plural Entertainment, the production subsid of Spanish media and publishing giant Prisa, hooked up in October with Televisa Cine, Televisa's production and distribution arm, to co-produce feature films, made-for-TV movies and miniseries.
First projects include an animated feature "En busca de mama gallina," (Looking for Mommy Chicken) and the bigscreen adaptation of "La reina del sur," from a bestselling novel by journalist-writer Arturo Perez-Reverte. Agustin Diaz Yanes ("No News From God") is writing the screenplay of this $25 million movie.
All of which does not mark -- as yet at least -- anyseismic changes in Latin America's media landscape, wrought by Spanish players.
Arguably, the biggest concrete achievements by Spanish companies last year in Latin America were Televisa and TV Globo's production of Spanish Endemol format "Operacion Triunfo," following co-production pacts between the Latin American giants and Endemol (a Telefonica subsid).
Not that Spain's top TV execs rule out developments in 2003.
According to some, the sheer cheapness of TV assets in Venezuela and Argentina could signal changes in ownership this year. Telefonica already sold its controlling share in Argentine terrestrial web Azul TV in 2002. Irisarri says, "There will be light at the end of the tunnel (beginning in the) second half (of) 2003."
Juarez also notes the possibility, or at least need for, a "free-to-air broadcasting network covering the whole of Latin America and Spain. I think it will be on the agenda in 2003, and companies with contents can lead the initiative."
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