Over the past few years, investments in high-quality Arabic productions have steadily increased, thereby inspiring production houses to cater to that demand.
Content seemed to dominate the conversation at the ASBU BroadcastPro Summit, and it’s certainly the content players that walked away with most of the prizes at the awards gala we hosted on November 16 at Westin Mina Seyahi. We have heard it said that since 2020, half a billion dollars has been spent on developing Arabic originals just for streaming platforms.
Investments in high-value Arabic productions have gone up steadily over the last few years and aggressive investments from MBC and OSN in that space have perhaps inspired more production houses to start catering to that demand. The rise of small media houses that take these Arabic productions to international shores and make them available in partnership with major cable or telco operators in those countries has further fed this appetite. Lebanese production house Cedars Art Production also landed a major coup in October with the sale of the format of Al Hayba – one of its productions – to a leading Turkish production house.
As someone who has been part of the BroadcastPro jury for the last eleven years, I have witnessed an evolution in the quality of the productions from a tech and story point of view. Gone are the patchy abstract stories; today we have well-rounded, sophisticated productions that hold their own against any international production. This is indeed a proud moment for the Arab world, and we had the joy of celebrating some of those truly compelling stories at the ASBU BroadcastPro Awards.
As the UAE celebrates its 50th anniversary, it’s also a truly proud moment for the country as high-quality productions helmed by Emirati teams are now making headlines. Al Sununu from Visioneers is a good example, but this is only the tip of the iceberg. BroadcastPro also celebrated several other players who are continuously innovating in terms of both technology and strategy. This issue is an opportunity to relive some of those glorious moments from last month.
