Tag: Graham Fry

  • Martin Baker is TWI’s commercial director

    Martin Baker is TWI’s commercial director

    MUMBAI: Television production house TWI has appointed Carlton Content’s former commercial director Martin Baker to take on a similar role with it.

    His responsibilities will include overseeing all TWI’s contractual relationships with broadcasters and co-production partners. He assumes his position next month..

    The 44 year old Baker will also work closely with TWI senior VP- production and business development, Alastair Waddington, and its director of programming and production – Sport, Graham Fry, in relation to all TWI’s production business.

    This amounts to nearly 9,000 hours a year. And he will have input into the business development arena overseen by Waddington.

    TWI has stated that the new appointment reflects its growing activities across not only its traditional heartland of sports programming, but also in the entertainment and factual fields. This expansion into new areas has seen TWI win international awards for its In Colour documentary strand. This was the catalyst for burgeoning international sales of entertainment formats like I’d Do Anything, which has currently been sold or optioned in 24 countries.

    TWI was recently appointed as the host broadcaster for the 15th Doha Asian Games 2006, in a joint venture with HBS.

    As commercial director at Carlton, Baker was responsible for major deals for UK and international co-production, including a $20m international production fund with PBS. Baker was previously controller of business affairs at Carlton, and before that controller of legal and business affairs at Central TV.

  • TWI extends contract with FA Premier League

    TWI extends contract with FA Premier League

    MUMBAI: TWI has announced that it was re-appointed by the FA Premier League to be its production partner. TWI will produce and distribute all its matches of the season for the TV market.

    The three-year-deal will offer international licencees of the Premier League all 380 matches of the season live via satellite. It also covers annual production of 41 weekly preview shows and 33 highlight shows.

    The new venture will be known as FA Premier League Productions and is based at TWIs UK production base in Chiswick London.

    TWIs director of programming and production, sport Graham Fry added, “Our relationship with the Premier League has been ongoing for the past six years. The Barclays Premiership continues to be a global success and together with the FA Premier League, TWI is confident that we will be able to achieve even greater heights in building its popularity and profile worldwide over the next three years.”

    Premier League CEO, Richard Scudamore said, “The Barclays English Premier League is broadcast in over 160 countries with a global home reach in excess of 570 million, making it the worlds most watched domestic league competition.

    “To ensure that we consolidate and develop this position, it is crucial the quality of production matches the quality of our competition, especially given the increase in the number of games available. We have every confidence that our continuing relationship with TWI, in the guise of FA Premier League Productions, will ensure the high standards our international broadcast partners have come to expect will carry on and improve.”

  • TWI’s TV innovations for darts championships

    LONDON: Independent sports producer and sports programme distributor TWI will produce an innovative Lakeside World Professional Darts Championships for BBC TV next January.
    Part of the IMG Group of companies founded by Mark McCormack in the 1960s, TWI will be introducing new production and presentation techniques, and on-screen innovations. These will include three-way split screens, and the most up-to-date and informative graphics and statistics ever seen in televised darts.
    TWI executive producer Graham Fry was quoted in an official release saying, “We are delighted to be producing the Lakeside World Professional Championships for the BBC. We are hoping to make them even more colourful and entertaining than they have been in the past – with a whole range of feature ideas, entertainment initiatives, and a competition with a prize”.
    TWI already produces snooker including the Embassy World Championships from The Crucible as well as many more major televised sporting events around the world TWI will also be producing the 30th Anniversary Winmau World Masters for BBC TV from 1-2 November. 
    In addition to Fry, the TWI darts production team will include show producer Stuart Watts and director Simon Wheeler, who has previously produced darts for BBC, satellite and cable TV. The match director will be Malcolm Kemp, who has been producing the coverage from Lakeside for BBC TV Sport since 1998..