Unfair practice hurt production houses

JAKARTA (JP): While the demand for locally produced teleserials is rocketing, their producers are in dire straits.

Every year, more than 2,000 sinetron (teleserials) titles are required by local television stations as they are obliged to have local content amounting to 70 percent of their total programs. But only a very few producers can meet the demand.

Last year, about 600 local production houses made TV programs. Only half of them were registered with the government. And now, most of them are dying.

The downfall of these companies is caused by several factors, including lack of professionalism, unhealthy business practice and a market monopoly.

Raam Punjabi, the founder of PT Tripar Multivision Plus, whose productions fill 90 percent of the TV time allotted for sinetron, told a recent seminar that the sinetron industry is a serious and lucrative business.

"Many producers, especially newcomers, are attracted to sinetron because of the glittering image but they often forget the business aspect," commented the movie mogul who has been involved in the film industry since the early l970s.

The industry is actually far from glamourous, he said. Like other ventures, those who want to succeed in the sinetron business need set strategies, namely skilled human resources, hi- tech hardware, strong capital, efficient managerial and marketing backup as well as a secure distribution pipeline. No less important is sharp and witty business intuition to lead the market, said Raam.

He also said that producing sinetron or movies is also a breakneck business. "Success does not come easily. It was really hard work. We frequently faced rocky periods and suffered from big losses if our productions failed in the market."

Competition in the sinetron business is not that intense because the market is still wide open, he said.

Zoraya Perucha, Corporate Communication Manager of ANteve television station, said every private television station badly needs as many local productions as possible to meet the government's local content requirement.

"Let's just say that we have 22 hours of television time a day, of which five hours are set aside solely for sinetron. We televise half-hour Indonesian sinetron, so we need at least 10 titles a day," said Zoraya.

ANteve has a policy to purchase sinetron from local production houses since the TV station cannot produce enough of its own.

"This way we let other production houses "live and eat" as well," she added.

With such big opportunities, small production houses are likely to corner a large proportion of the market.

But Marisa Haque Fawzi, the owner of independent production house PT Rana Artha Mulia Film Production, is bitter about the domination of PT Multvision Group in the sinetron market.

"People like us only occupy the remaining 10 percent of the market. So I concentrate on making quality sinetron. My mission is to make educative sinetron with entertaining packaging," said Marisa, whose production Salah Asoehan won the best drama serial category in the l994 sinetron festival.

Zoraya said that to make a quality sinetron, budget plays one of the most significant parts. Last year, the budget for each 75- minute movie made for television was Rp 125 million. To meet the planned budget, production houses must choose the most suitable actors, director and cameraman without sacrificing quality. They might use little-known actors or talented newcomers as a way to cut costs.

"There is the problem of accommodating good quality within a 30-minute sinetron production -- Rp 40 million per episode," she said.

It is hard for independent and low budget companies which produce "art and quality" sinetron to penetrate the market which prefers easy-to-watch and lighthearted products like melodramas, comedies and action-thrillers.

"It is all up to our creativity and canny speculation in creating themes that meet the market's demands as well as advertisers'," Raam defended.

Many production houses fail to meet the demand because their work is not liked by both the audience and the advertisers.

The "liked" and "not liked" products are currently determined solely on ratings conducted by Survey Research Indonesia (SRI).

Some unwritten rules set by TV stations demand local production houses test five to six episodes of 13-episode sinetron. If this sinetron gets good ratings, the TV stations will continue airing it.

But if there is no response from the audience, meaning poor ratings, the sinetron will vanish from the TV screens. That is how the story goes.

Conversely sinetron with high ratings attract advertisers and become a major source of revenue for the television stations.

Television observer Rakaryan S., however, revealed in the Kompas daily that there is still a lack of fairness in the business dealing between TV stations and production houses.

"Most local production houses are placed in a weak bargaining position when it comes to setting up business contracts with television stations," he was quoted as saying.

The TV stations, he said, will dictate the terms of deals which involving the holding of copyright including performing rights, merchandising rights and mechanical rights. That means that the bulk of revenue will go mostly to the TV stations.

Production houses, on the other hand, sometimes get paid late by the TV stations. "For big-budget companies, there will be no problem. But, small-scale firms will suffer from this kind of business arrangement. To produce a sinetron, they usually get loans from a bank. How can they pay their debts when they do not get paid properly," he said.

The saddest thing is that there is no standard business contract between production houses and television stations. Discrimination still exists.

A business deal with one production house will be different from a contract with another; it depends on personal factors more than professional judgments from TV executives, Rakaryan said.

Owners of production houses, the small-scale ones in particular, often lack confidence to sell their products at the right price and are likely to accept all the terms set by the TV stations.

Rakaryan urged production house executives to master all the necessary legal aspects of the sinetron industry to create a more healthy business. (raw/02)