International content licensing consultancy Rights Stuff, headed up by Wendy Bernfeld, is expanding its operation by teaming up with sports programming and digital channel veteran Amory Schwartz. Bernfeld and Schwartz have established a new Irish company, Rights Stuff Media (Ireland), to complement Bernfeld's longstanding international office in Amsterdam.
‘I am thrilled to be working again with Amory, a seasoned entrepreneur with a wealth of sports programming and channel development expertise. With the media landscape ever-evolving and the economy in freefall, new media and traditional TV companies are having to continually re-evaluate their position. Rights Stuff helps companies to establish or flex approaches and develop robust solutions relating to content acquisition, licensing, and business development,' commented Wendy Bernfeld, Managing Director, Rights Stuff.
Schwartz, previously co-founder and chief executive of NASN (North American Sports Network), the pan-European sports network which was acquired by ESPN in 2007, worked previously with Wendy Bernfeld within the Filmnet/ProNet/MNet/ Nethold group of companies and later with Canal Plus. He has notched up a formidable track record working on a variety of sports and entertainment projects, including television and online platform development, channel distribution and content licensing and acquisition.
‘Wendy has worked with an impressive list of media companies, and has developed great relationships with most of the major players as well as scouting and nurturing niche projects. We will utilise our complementary skill-sets and experience to help companies realise the full value of their content, and exploit these assets creatively and effectively across all suitable platforms and business models,' said Schwartz.
European-based Rights Stuff, established in 1999, works with a range of international content owners, telcos, IPTV operators, producers, distributors and TV, cable and satellite, internet and mobile channels; expertise and guidance is offered in pragmatic international content acquisition, business and legal consulting, and in deal structuring and rights exploitation across all forms of media. In recent years, extensive work has been carried out on evolving new digital media platforms around the world, and related content and business/consumer models.
Over the last decade, Rights Stuff BV has worked for an extensive range of clients including Joost, France Telecom/Orange, Endemol, Canal+, UPC/ChelloMedia, Fremantle, Sony, 2waytraffic, Movielink and Disney/ABC International Television (Europe).