Paris – Benjamin Salinas Sada, CEO of Mexico’s TV Azteca,Dominique Delport, Global Managing Director of Havas Group and Chairman of Vivendi Content, and Claire Bury, Deputy Director General in DG Connect, European Commission, with responsibility for regulatory aspects of the Digital Single Market are all set to keynote at MIPCOM 2017.

The world’s leading entertainment content market, MIPCOM takes place in Cannes, France, from 16-19 October, and this year takes as its over-arching conference theme, “The Global Race for Creative Connections”.

With a background in programme production, Benjamin Salinas Sada has been CEO of TV Azteca since October 2015, and as such leads one of the world’s two largest producers of Spanish-language television programming, operating four television networks in Mexico, Azteca America focused on the U.S. Hispanic market, and Azteca Web, which operates one of Mexico’s most popular websites. During his Media Mastermind Keynote scheduled for 4:15pm on Monday 16 October, Salinas will share his thoughts on the future of television and entertainment facing a multiplicity of distribution platforms and production companies, along with a market imbalance in which the present offer is not fulfilling increased demand for more and better content.

As Chairman of Vivendi Content, Dominique Delport leads all the French media group’s strategic projects around new content, new platforms and new forms of storytelling.
Vivendi Content works also to develop creative synergies between the group’s entities, including Canal+, Universal Music Group, Gameloft, and online video platform Dailymotion. Vivendi Content has successfully invested the field of non-scripted content, short series apps, and the production and distribution of global non-scripted TV shows, gameshows and documentaries. Thanks to this unique role alongside his responsibilities as Havas Group Global Managing Director, Delport will deliver his thoughts on the future of content, the future of formats and the impact of new devices and platforms in a post-digital era during a Media Mastermind Keynote.

Claire Bury, Deputy-Director General for the European Commission’s Directorate of Communications, Networks, Content and Technology (DG CNECT), will address the topic: How will the European digital single market affect my business? Several initiatives of the European Commission aim at facilitating cross-border access to online content and strengthening the role of creative industries in the online environment. For example, consumers will soon be able to benefit from the new rules on the portability of online content services that have recently been approved by the European Parliament and Council. Claire Bury will take the opportunity and explain the European Commission’s recent proposals on the modernisation of copyright rules as well as the Audiovisual Media Services Directive, which are reaching a crucial phase in the European Parliament and Council.

Fostering the creation and distribution of European audiovisual works is one of the main objectives of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive. The Commission proposal for the revision of this Directive keeps this goal very much in mind. The proposal on this issue is two-fold: on one side it reinforces the obligation of VOD players regarding the promotion of European works while, on the other, it contributes to secure investment in content development and production by liberalizing rules on audiovisual commercial communications. The rules proposed in the Directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market notably aim at reinforcing the right holders’ ability to control the use of their content on video-sharing platforms. Specific rules have also been proposed to facilitate the cross-border distribution of TV and radio programmes.

The European Commission is also backing the subsequent MIPCOM session on the Media Programme Beyond 2020: Connecting Content, Financing and Audiences. MEDIA Programme is well known for supporting quality TV content from The Bridge to The Babylon Berlin. The European Commission is now preparing proposals for the new MEDIA programme which will start in 2021. How could the MEDIA Programme best support the TV sector in the changing entertainment landscape?

The above speakers join those previously announced to address MIPCOM 2017, featuring major players in the mobile and social media space. These include Domingo Corral, head of Original Programming at Movistar+; Facebook ’s Ricky Van Veen, Head of Global Creative Strategy and Daniel Danker, the platform’s Director of Video Product; and Sean Mills, Snapchat’s Senior Director of Content Programming.