French bank makes N.Y. transfer

Societe Generale deposits film exec in U.S.

By ADAM DAWTREY

In the teeth of the credit crunch, despite the threat of a U.S. recession and regardless of its own recent woes, the giant French bank Societe Generale is seeking to ramp up its engagement with Hollywood.

SocGen is dispatching Premila Hoon, its global head of film finance, from London to New York, where she will spearhead the bank's relationships with the studios and other major producers.

Her Atlantic crossing is a statement of positive intent by SocGen, at a time of worsening conditions in the global financial markets, and coming just weeks after the bank cut back its New York media team.

Hoon will continue to run SocGen's European film group, while taking a more direct personal role in expanding the bank's entertainment financing operations in the U.S. Her long-time lieutenant Thomas Gardiner is moving with her to New York next month.

Hoon is one of the most experienced bankers in international film. A glamorous and exotic figure among the dark masculine suits of the financial world, she was born and raised in the ancient Syriac Christian community of south India, but has spent her entire career in London since graduating from business school three decades ago.

She joined SocGen in 1998 from Guinness Mahon, where she was a key financier for leading British producers such as Merchant Ivory, Working Title and Palace, carving a reputation as a classy operator who dealt with the rough diamonds of the indie film biz without getting her hands dirty.

At SocGen, she moved away from single project financing toward larger corporate and slate financing deals on both sides of the Atlantic.

She structured $123 million in senior debt for Sparrowhawk Media to buy the Hallmark Intl. channels (recently sold at a handsome profit to NBC Universal); helped 3i to buy Brit intellectual property outfit Chorion with a $111 million loan; and arranged a $118 million credit line for Luc Besson's EuropaCorp. She also provided Wild Bunch with the bank deal for its Steven Soderbergh project "Che."

Her efforts have already established the Gallic bank as an important player in the U.S. biz over the past couple of years. In 2006, she arranged a $150 million credit line for Jim Robinson's Morgan Creek and a $200 million financing for Ivan Reitman and Tom Pollock's Cold Spring Pictures.

After participating in the first two hugely successful Dune slate deals with 20th Century Fox, SocGen stepped up last summer to become the lead bank in Dune III, a $580 million financing comprising $415 million in debt arranged by SocGen and $165 million in equity from hedge fund Dune Capital.

Hoon describes Dune proudly as "the Rolls Royce deal of the film business," thanks to the stellar performance of the Fox slate. She credits Fox with its willingness to structure a fair deal for investors to share fully in the rewards as well as the risks of production -- a far-sighted attitude less evident in some other studio slate deals.

"Dumb money has been available in the past, but the world has changed," she comments. "When you're dealing with the capital markets as they are now operating, you must give the investor the best chance of the best return. Very few people outsmart a studio, but Fox make the decision that they want a long-term partner."

That may explain why SocGen was able to syndicate the debt without hitch last October, when the credit crunch was already biting deep and banks were starting to batten down their hatches.

But the financial weather has worsened again since then, and Hoon acknowledges it would be a challenge to float a similar deal today. Her move to New York was in the works before the recent turmoil, but it will put her in the best place to fathom what deal-making opportunities now exist under the new conditions.

"For me personally and for the bank, our activity has to be led out of New York, where the capital markets are, and where we can work out what's the next wave," she says.