Fugitive expands sales by hiring Fox, Endemol Shine, Tinopolis & DRG alums

L-R: Anne Roder-Botbol, Joanna Rowley, Charo Penedo, Tania Jacobson

UK-based production and financing company Fugitive is expanding its sales team, with four new senior hires in the US, Spain, France and the UK.

All four will operate as SVP’s and will be focused on pre-sales for the company’s growing slate of scripted and unscripted projects, as well as its catalogue of completed programming and formats.

Fugitive was founded in March last year by former Cineflix Rights exec Anthony Kimble, working across scripted, unscripted and formats. Former Nordic Entertainment Group format boss Merrily Ross joined the company soon after to head up its unscripted output.

Based in London, Joanna Rowley has been hired to cover Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the Nordic region. She is a freelance sales consultant who worked as an executive director at Fox Networks Group content distribution, prior to its acquisition by Disney. Prior to that, Rowley spent many years as a regional sales director for National Geographic Television International, as well as for its previous incarnation, Explore International.

Former Endemol Shine SVP Tania Jacobson will meanwhile be based in Los Angeles and handle Fugitive’s sales and formats business in Canada. Jacobson was also formerly the VP of North American sales for ITV Studios Global Entertainment. Jacobson started her career in TV with Granada Television in the UK before moving to America to oversee Canadian sales for the company, ahead of it becoming ITV.

Charo Penedo will be based in Madrid and responsible for Spain, Portugal and Latin America. She started her career with Hit Entertainment in London, before joining Sunset & Vine International, which is now part of Tinopolis. Penedo also worked at Optomen, where she was responsible for driving sales of the Kitchen Nightmares format and finished show, before moving to Madrid to look after Southern Europe for Discovery. Penedo has also held roles at Cineflix Rights and Belgian format business Primitives.

Based in Paris, Anne Roder-Botbol will represent French and German-speaking territories, as well as Italy and Benelux, for Fugitive. Starting her career at TVF International, Roder-Botbol moved on to Channel 4 International, where she was responsible for the first format sales of Supernanny and That’ll Teach ‘Em in France and Germany. She then joined DRG as VP sales, where she worked across finished tape sales, formats and drama remakes – including securing local versions of Doc Martin in a number of territories, including France.

Fugitive’s Anthony Kimble said: “Merrily and I are thrilled to welcome Joanna, Anne, Tania and Charo to the Fugitive team. It is an exciting time for the business with new projects for development and financing, as well as a growing catalogue of finished shows and formats to take out to the market.

“We feel very lucky to have created such an experienced international network so quickly and are already seeing the benefit of the team’s extensive territory expertise, combined contacts book and long-standing industry relationships.”

Fugitive recently partnered with South Africa’s Yesterday producer Helena Spring Films to develop its scripted slate for TV and in May struck an exclusive deal in the UK to represent a range of shows from Gil Formats, the Israeli firm behind Pregnant & Platonic and Life On Duty.