TV tie-up is more pleasing with Love Island sequel

Banijay NV

15/01/2026 10:23

The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are her own. Refiles to fix punctuation in headline.

By Jennifer Johnson

LONDON, Jan 15 (Reuters Breakingviews) - The best reality TV competitions invite contestants to couple up and then betray each other. Alliances, it seems, are just as fluid behind the camera. France’s Banijay BNJ.AS, the owner of the Big Brother and Survivor franchises, has confirmed it’s in merger talks with The Traitors’ creator All3Media. Both parties have also explored various tie-ups with ITV ITV.L in the recent past, though none were successful. While this new combination would create a European production champion, there could be more twists in the M&A plotline.

Television commissioning and distribution are increasingly dominated by a handful of deep-pocketed U.S. streaming services. Against this backdrop, it makes sense for smaller production companies – which create, finance and deliver programmes – to pool their resources. This certainly appears to be Banijay’s view. Sources told Reuters that the Amsterdam-listed group entered talks with All3Media to merge their production businesses at the end of last year, after similar discussions over ITV’s Studios unit fell apart. That could effectively involve a carve-up of Banijay itself, which also makes money through online gaming.

With combined 2024 revenues of almost 4.5 billion euros, and 649 million euros of EBITDA, the union would be a relative giant of European television. Using Banijay’s own trailing EV/EBITDA multiple of 7 times, per Visible Alpha, the merged production business could be worth 4.5 billion euros. That might be conservative: previous transactions have valued TV studios as high as 10 times EBITDA. A deal might still require some haggling: All3Media is smaller and had net debt equivalent to nearly 8 times EBITDA in 2024. Owner Redbird IMI may therefore need to pony up some cash to hang on to a meaningful stake, Reuters says.

History suggests there could be savings on the table. Banijay’s 2020 acquisition of Endemol Shine delivered cost reductions of 67 million euros across 18 months, equivalent to 2.5% of group sales at the time. On that basis, an All3Media deal would produce synergies of around 110 million euros, worth nearly 800 million euros after tax and capitalised.

The snag is that even that merged entity would still be a minnow next to the likes of Netflix NFLX.O, which spent some $16 billion on new content in 2024. Yet the now larger Banijay/All3Media would be better placed to woo ITV, the maker of Love Island. The UK company confirmed last year that it was in talks to sell its broadcast division to Comcast-owned Sky. If that deal goes through, the rump studio division would be left conspicuously alone, and under pressure to couple up. A further deal would unite three of the top five players in European TV production, with 2024 revenues of nearly 7 billion euros. The lesson from reality TV shows is that it’s hard to stay single and survive for long.

Follow Jennifer Johnson on Bluesky and LinkedIn.

CONTEXT NEWS

Banijay, a France-based television production and betting group, on January 13 said it was in talks with All3Media-owner Redbird IMI over a potential combination of the two companies.

Discussions between the two groups centre on combining Banijay’s Entertainment & Live unit with All3Media’s television production business, Reuters reported on January 13, citing people familiar with the matter.

Banijay's gaming business is catching up with its TV arm https://www.reuters.com/graphics/BRV-BRV/lbvgmdzxxvq/chart.png

(Editing by Neil Unmack; Production by Streisand Neto)

((For previous columns by the author, Reuters customers can click on JOHNSON/Jennifer.Johnson@thomsonreuters.com))