Unique and ground-breaking agreement will bring more stories of the Caribbean to Flow customers and support local filmmaking talent development
Cable & Wireless Communications (C&W), operator of the Flow brand, today announced an exclusive five-year partnership agreement with CaribbeanTales, a regional media company focused on developing Caribbean content for multi-media broadcast. Under the agreement, Flow, as lead sponsor, will support CaribbeanTales’ Incubator (CTI) to develop unique content for the region. This partnership also means Flow customers will have access to a huge range of exciting, locally and regionally produced content.
Commenting on the partnership, John Reid, President of C&W’s Consumer Group, said, “This is an exciting day for Flow. We are thrilled to be partnering with CaribbeanTales to support local filmmakers and producers, and we have long recognised that we needed a partner whose aspirations for the Caribbean were aligned with our own objectives.”
According to Reid, “The Caribbean has one of the most vibrant cultural scenes in the world, famed for its music, food and sport. Our customers consistently tell us that they want to see high quality, local content that tells the stories of their culture, their communities, and their countries, and that this need is not being met today. Our CaribbeanTales partnership is focused on bringing these two strands together – translating the inherent cultural richness of the Caribbean into compelling, must-watch audio visual content for the benefit of both Flow’s customers, as well as developing the Caribbean audio visual industry.”
CT Incubator in Session – Christopher Laird, Senior Mentor, addresses the participants.
CaribbeanTales is the leading supporter of content generation in the Caribbean, with an enormous library of content that tells the tales of everyday Caribbean people and the Diaspora, through dramas, documentaries, animation, comedies and short films. “With our CaribbeanTales partnership we are building on our commitment to support, develop and distribute Caribbean content for Caribbean viewers,” Reid concluded.
CEO of CaribbeanTales, Frances-Anne Solomon said: “This wonderful partnership provides an injection of energy and resources into the region’s filmmaking processes, and has the potential to be a game changer for our emerging industry. There is now, for the first time, a consistent mechanism through which the most compelling regional projects from the most talented producers can get funding and be seen by wide audiences across the region. I am looking forward to working with Flow, and with producers and other partners to build on this important milestone in the establishment of a sustainable indigenous industry for the Caribbean”.
Nicole Brooks, CTI Manager, leads the The Big Pitch, at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, Sept 13th 2015.
The CaribbeanTales Incubator is a year-round development and production hub for Caribbean and Caribbean Diaspora Producers that aims to create strong, sustainable content for the global market. As part of the new partnership, Flow and CaribbeanTales will work to fund the most promising new projects from idea to pilot production, thus helping to support the growth and development of Caribbean filmmaking talent. In addition, later this year Flow will launch CaribbeanTales-TV on its Video On Demand platform, enabling customers to view must-watch Caribbean content at their convenience.
