For an investment firm with only 14 employees and a name that intentionally flys under-the-radar, Content Partners has an outsized impact as a blue chip Hollywood rightsholder.
The Mid-Wilshire-based L.A. company, founded by ex-Brillstein exec Steven Blume and former William Morris Agency COO Steven Kram, owns half of the entire C.S.I. procedural franchise (800-plus episodes) as part of its 3,000 hours of TV and counts chunks of a studio film library that totals upwards of 800 movies, including the entire Revolution Studios catalog (military actioner Black Hawk Down, Martin Scorsese feature Hugo, Natalie Portman drama Black Swan and Vin Diesel’s xXx action series among them).
Since 2006, the firm has quietly worked with all the major studios and many of the power players in town to buy out backend profit participation from talent and production companies after projects have completed their initial run, amassing a large holding of titles in the process. Taking a stake in what it sees premium film, TV or music IP to monetize in the long tail is its stock-in-trade. And its partial or outright holdings have grown by more than 300 film titles over the past several years.
Now it’s getting a notable expansion in capital available to its firm for future acquisitions. On Tuesday, the Global Credit platform of investment giant Carlyle said that it provided a new single-asset continuation vehicle giving Content Partners access to funding for growth while allowing existing investors the option to cash out or participate in further ventures with the firm.
