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Bajgar is in charge of programme development for the whole of CME
July 20, 2010, E15
Aleš Borovan
Czech managers have again increased their share in the running of the Bermudan media holding, CME, which owns TV Nova. Radek Bajgar, who up until now has been supervising the creation of new programmes at Nova, has begun doing the same for the whole of CME.
He is now the third Czech in CME’s top management team. Towards the end of last year Petr Dvořák, the director of Nova, was appointed head of the company’s broadcasting division. Before that Romana Wyllie (formerly Tomasová) was appointed vice-president for corporate communication.
“Radek Bajgar holds the post of creative director at CME level. Therefore he is responsible for the creative side of development in all six countries that CME operates in, including the development of formats for other countries,” said Dvořák. According to him the new creative director should come up with plenty of ideas and formats for the needs of CME’s television companies over the next five years. He is also responsible for cooperation between individual CME countries and the development of film screenplays.
The first signs can already be seen that formats are being exchanged between CME television companies: for example TV Nova’s serial Ordinace v růžové zahradě is being made under licence in Slovakia whereas the Slovakian serial Susedia is being made in Slovenia. The stations are also selling completed works amongst themselves. For example, according to Nova’s spokesperson Michaela Fričová, Kriminálka Anděl is selling well.
Bajgar, who was behind the starting up of new serials such as Comeback and Soukromé pasti, has taken up his post in the middle of the complicated process of the internal restructuring of the company. This involves extensive changes to the way new programmes are made. Whereas up until now this was done within the television companies, independent production companies are now responsible for this. For example in the spring CET 21 (the owner of the licence to Nova) bought one hundred percent of the company Media Pro Pictures for a thousand euros from the other members of the CME group.
Nova’s previous production manager, Petr Erben, has become director of Media Pro, and Bajgar is in charge of development. According to Dvořák, the company has separate departments for film and television drama production and departments for reality shows and entertainment programmes. It also owns the subsidiary companies Taková normální rodinka and Změna.
The result of the reorganisation of CME should be a company that will stand on three pillars: broadcasting, content and new media (internet). “Our aim is to become one of the largest media companies in Europe by 2014,” CME’s president, Adrian Sarbu, said at a recent investor conference.
For additional information, please contact:
Romana Wyllie
Vice President of Corporate Communications
Central European Media Enterprises
Krizeneckeho nam. 1078/5
152 00 Praha 5
Czech Republic
+420 242 465 525
romana.wyllie@cme-net.com
