Walt Disney‘s streaming service Disney+ continues to strike what it has consistently described as “landmark” content agreements with big European broadcasters, on Friday adding RTVE in Spain to its list of partners.
“Disney+ and RTVE have reached a strategic agreement that may bring a choice of the general public broadcaster’s most successful shows to Disney+, starting March 31,” the businesses said. “This collaboration expands the entertainment offering available to Disney+ customers, while providing RTVE with a brand new distribution window that expands the reach of its content and connects with recent, younger audiences across Spain.” Financial terms weren’t disclosed.
THR understands that the RTVE agreement marks the primary time that a state broadcaster in Europe has agreed to make shows available on a streaming platform the day after their linear broadcasts.
The programming pact adds to its growing variety of existing deals with European free-to-air broadcasters, namely ITV within the U.K., which was recently prolonged to Hulu, ARD and ZDF in Germany, SIC in Portugal and Atresmedia in Spain. The RTVE deal builds on Disney’s agreement in Spain with Atresmedia and its broader strategy of collaborating with major broadcasters across the continent.
Newly minted Disney CEO Josh D’Amaro recently outlined his vision to make Disney+ the “digital centerpiece” of the corporate. Last 12 months, Karl Holmes, general manager for Disney+ EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa), emphasized the win-win aspect of content deals with European broadcasters. “Across the markets we operate in Europe, the large free-to-air channels still aggregate the most important audiences, have the most important shows, and have the most important production budgets,” he said. “It’s really vital we do work with free-to-air. So we license content to free-to-air. We license content from free-to-air. Now we have co-production agreements in place with many of the large free-to-air broadcasters across Europe.”
Disney executives have also highlighted advantages to each parties in such deals, whose details rely on local needs. The broadcasters get a possibility to achieve younger audiences, while Disney+ can complement its global hit content with local programming.
The most recent agreement reinforces Disney+’s commitment to Spanish audiovisual production and talent, in addition to RTVE’s ambition to maximise the visibility of its content through partnerships with global platforms. “Each corporations approach this cope with the intention of constant to explore recent synergies that contribute to the expansion and strengthening of their editorial and audiovisual strategies,” in response to Friday’s press statement.
Among the many select drama and reality content covered by the Disney+ cope with RTVE is MasterChef, certainly one of the top-performing shows in Spain. Disney+ will premiere the entire 14th season of the series, produced by RTVE in collaboration with Shine Iberia, a part of Banijay Iberia, and season 11 of MasterChef Celebrity, immediately after their broadcast on the La1 network.
Among the many scripted content covered by the deal is Rojo Sobre Blanco, an upcoming series produced by Mediawan’s Good Mood. Further titles will likely be announced at a later date.
“RTVE is loved by viewers in Spain, with a wealthy heritage of a long time of incredible shows,” said Holmes. “Through this agreement, we’re delighted to bring a few of RTVE’s most iconic recent shows to Disney+ customers, that are a number of the hottest and recognized formats in Spanish television. Incorporating these programs into Disney+ strengthens our ambition to complement the service, while giving greater visibility to the extraordinary creative talent across Spain.”
He added: “This collaboration reflects our commitment to working closely with Europe’s best free‑to‑air broadcasters, bringing their high‑quality local storytelling to younger and recent audiences. We stay up for starting this journey with RTVE and are confident it is going to result in many more projects together.”