Invest in Creative Enterprise 2024

What happens when a creator’s authenticity is compromised or lost entirely on the journey between idea inception and final delivery? It’s an issue that married business owners Aiwan Obinyan and Dr. Tamanda Walker have encountered often during their time working as storytellers. So much so that it inspired them to found AiAi Studios, a production house that’s levelling the playing field when it comes to unearthing stories from Black and under-represented creators.  

 “It’s about promoting the unapologetic, authentic and unmolested voices of Black women,” says Obinyan of the ethos that runs throughout everything this Leeds-based studio puts its mind to.  Starting in the music industry before working in the audio and film production world, Obinyan noticed a questionable trend in the types of stories that tended to break through. “Positive voices rarely got a look in. It was always the overly sexualised stuff because sex sells,” she explains. “It was always a certain kind of Black woman’s voice that got the light of day.” 

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Pop culture may be full of gritty reboots at the moment but producer Angela Gourley hopes to change the narrative. Having carved out an extensive career in film and TV and worked on several hugely popular shows, she switched gears in 2017 to create Amber Eye Fims. Here, she’s built a small slate of projects for the big and small screen that she describes as the “witty, feel-good and female-led” stories that she’d like to see more of. 

 Focusing on diverse storytelling and content that makes you think as well as smile, Amber Eye Films currently has various projects in various stages of development that span a range of genres. Movie Safeguard is a Die Hard-style action thriller set in a high-tech department store; Bethlehem Wales is a festive refugee comedy-drama and Don’t Wake Up is a time-loop terror tale. Meanwhile, both oil smuggling dramedy Crude and Lit, a fish-out-of-water tale that sees a time-travelling Emily Bronte forced to navigate the diversities of modern-day Britain are both aimed at the high-end TV marketplace. 

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The road to securing finance can be a complex path to follow. Few know this as well as Emily Bailey. In her career so far, she’s managed to spin a game that started life as a university dissertation project into a successful title that’s busy crowdfunding its next phase. In fact, Project Grove proved so popular with audiences that it led Bailey to start her own indie studio, leading a small team of developers and learning on the job about video game finance.

At the same time, she’s made a point of being vocal about the health of the UK’s games development sector and how it can learn from international models, which has positively impacted her work at Code Coven, the gaming accelerator helping marginalised talent.

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Founded in 2018, Caspian Films was created to produce powerful stories from diverse and under-represented talent, each aimed at international audiences. At its core are Georgie Paget and Thembisa Cochrane, two producers who met while working on the same project and quickly discovered they shared similar sensibilities when it came to the projects they wanted to make.  

Wasting no time, they produced 2019’s family drama Us Among The Stones with a biopic of potter Clarice Cliff, The Colour Room, released in 2021. According to Paget, both films are indicative of the stories Caspian Films wants to be known for. “We tend to go for untold stories of ordinary people doing really interesting things,” she says, highlighting how rare it is to see a female-focused biopic of someone who isn’t a Royal. “Our stories are often about females or people from underrepresented, diverse backgrounds. That continues to impact the projects we have on our slate.” 

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With so much content vying for our attention, getting your work seen can often be trickier than bringing it to life. This uphill battle is even harder for independent storytellers who struggle to get their work exhibited and distributed. It’s a problem that business founders Urvisha Patel and Presh Williams know all too well. Having got their start in film exhibition and marketing with their first company Big Picture Film Club, the pair heard these industry woes first-hand and decided to create something new that tackles them head-on.

“We started Big Picture Film Club to support emerging filmmakers who were trying to break into the scene and after every screening we held, we’d always get the same questions: ‘Can you help us find a distributor or someone who can help us with funding?’” remembers Patel, detailing the origins of their latest venture. “That’s what inspired us to sit down and have conversations with the network that we’d built up over the past eight years.”

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The UK’s live music sector is booming. Having recovered from its post-pandemic slump, the industry has added billions to the UK economy, with a further 7.2% increase from its 2019 pre-pandemic peak predicted before 2027 arrives. It’s undeniably positive news – but what happens when your favourite band or artist visits your city and you’re unable to attend their show? Copper Candle director James Simpson may have the answer.

“I have social anxiety so I’ll never go to a Metallica concert but I’ll get to see them in Fortnite and that’s exciting,” he says, explaining how live events in digital spaces are quickly becoming the new future for this lucrative industry. He’s not wrong either. Just days after our conversation, the world’s biggest metal band did indeed bring their live experience to one of the world’s most popular video games. “There will be millions of us watching and we’ll all be people who don’t get to see live concerts often,” adds Simpson. “The accessibility it creates is fantastic.”

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Frolic Films CEO Camilla Wren already had an enviable career in the film and high-end TV sectors before she joined 2024’s Investment Readiness cohort. However, the indie production house she hopes to catalyse with the scheme’s intensive business support has been with her every step of the way, patiently waiting for its moment to step into the spotlight.  

“I incorporated Frolic Films way back in 2009 when I was a Production Co-Ordinator,” she tells us, remembering her early days working at HETV company Left Bank Pictures. “I thought ‘I want to do this, maybe I’ll set up a production company’ and it remained dormant until recently. Frolic as a brand was always in the back of my mind and waiting until I had the experience to properly get it off the ground,” admits Wren. “I’ve always had a desire to create my own slate of projects with a clear and distinct voice.”  

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There are many roads to success. For gaming and software experts Future Tech Labs, that path is leading them to a place they believe will be the new central hub for audience interaction. It’s an area they’re already familiar with. Their previous success with the groundbreaking AR astronomy app Star Chart let over 50 million users explore and share their love of the universe, and now their flagship title – Multiverse – a sprawling Oculus VR title with over one million user-generated locations, lets players create and build their own Metaverses – worlds that others can visit socially. At the heart of each is a communal ethos that harks back to the controller-sharing gameplay of old – but one with digital innovation at its core. 

“All of our work relies on cutting-edge technology that uses the latest trends and innovations to make each product stand out, that’s who we are as a company,” explains San Shepherd, CEO and Director of Future Tech Labs. “Our success is very much defined by what we believe is the future of gaming and interaction itself – which is social software and putting people right at the heart of it.”  

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Marketing… there’s no getting around it. If you’ve got a great idea, you’ll eventually have to sell it to audiences and to be successful, it helps to know what you’re doing. While a quick Google search will deliver a tangle of digital resources, having bespoke training on the skills you’ll need to gather and speak to your desired audience is invaluable. In fact, it’s the reason why creative business founder Peter Storey set up his latest venture, Greenlit.com. 

“We help creative people raise money,” says Storey, explaining his company’s expertise. Having carved out an extensive career in theatre and film, Storey eventually decided to pivot towards business building, specifically helping others get the tools they need to market their brand. “We initially focused on film but soon broadened into anything with an audience,” he adds. “We now work with theatre and music projects and we’re dipping into gaming too.” 

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Oliver Ellis and Helen Howells have over 50 years combined experience in TV production and rights management, which is why they were perfectly placed to create Hoho Entertainment. Founded in 2011, their company combines both of its owners’ industry expertise to provide a one-stop shop for children’s programming and its accompanying rights, with a dedication to crafting vibrant, entertaining and engaging children’s content at the core of everything it does. 

“We set up Hoho with a mission to entertain children worldwide,” says Ellis, talking us through the company’s current slate of projects. “We started with Cloudbabies for Cbeebies, then continued with other shows like Shane the Chef for Channel 5/Milkshake and most recently, Toad & Friends for Warner Media Discovery. And because of our distribution background, it made sense to do the distribution of these shows ourselves as well,” adds the co-founder.  

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Creative Enterprise Investment Readiness is designed to give founders all the advice they’ll need to successfully navigate the often complex world of investment. However, for one of its cohort members, the journey has been slightly different. As the founder of the independent production house Inceptive Films, Dominique Webb was delighted to be faced with an investment offer before her time on the scheme had reached its halfway point – but she quickly discovered her involvement with Investment Readiness was a particularly useful tool.  

“While this investment opportunity happened separately from my time on the programme, I think I would have been in a very different situation without its guidance,” admits Webb, speaking as the ink on her investment offer was drying. “It’s been incredible to have a mentor to talk to and bounce ideas off because I’m doing it for real. Having them say things like ‘stand firm’ and ‘remember your value’ – and having a respected organisation like Creative UK behind me – it just adds a level of respect,” she adds. “It’s been brilliant.”  

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Whatever your area of expertise, finding the right partner to help bring your work to life is key. For Jolly Griffin, that collaboration was forged between film producer Anna Griffin and TV producer and screenwriter Jolyon Rubinstein. Together, their work spanning both big and small screen entertainment led them to create a versatile new production company with big ambitions.  

“My background is film and Jolyon’s background is TV but we came together with the passion and want to produce high-level drama predominantly for TV but also with a small film slate,” says Griffin, talking us through the process that led to the formation of Jolly Griffin. “We really want to utilise what the indie film world is so good at, which is interrogating character and script, and put that into our TV projects because if you don’t, you’ve got no chance of getting anything through the door.”  

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“I’ve written 30,000 words on my 10-year plan,” smiles Joseph Morel, co-founder of indie production company Neon Picturehouse and member of 2024’s Investment Readiness cohort. He’s not lying either. A note-filled A4 page sits directly behind him as we speak, presumably detailing how he hopes to change the world with his studio’s intimate and powerful storytelling. 

“In five years, I’d like our first film to be finished and to be working on a second feature, possibly with more projects from other writers and directors under the Neon Picturehouse banner. I’m less concerned with making the company the biggest thing ever,” he says, candidly detailing his visions for the future. “The films are the main thing and Neon Picturehouse is a home for them.”   

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Helping international stories reach mainstream audiences has always been tricky. However thanks to streaming, this content has not only been delivered directly into homes across the UK but welcomed with eager eyes. It’s a cultural pivot point that has paved the way for Paguro Film to make its mark on pop culture. Founded by producer Giada Mazzoleni, it’s already found success with two critically praised documentaries focusing on two giants of Italian cinema. Now, with the help of Creative Enterprise, Mazzoleni is ready to take things to the next level.  

“I’ve always worked in Italy’s film and TV sector for big companies like Disney and Freemantle and in 2017 I decided to start my own production company,” says Mazzoleni, recalling the path that led her to create Paguro Film. “I wanted to use my links with the Italian markets to produce content that would focus on Italian topics but still be of interest to international markets.”  

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The market gap that creative business founder Gabriel Isserlis is working to fill has been staring many in the face for years. Those working in the creator sector want nothing more than to bring their big ideas to life and yet so much of their time is eaten up by tasks that have nothing to do with being creative. If this situation sounds a little close to home, then fear not – Isserlis has a plan to realign this work-business-balance, starting with SuperScout. 

“I have a background in the creative industries and technology,” explains Isserlis, talking us through the career history that led him to his current company. After studying filmmaking and computer programming at university, he spent time dabbling in a range of creative mediums from photography and film, to music, theater and events – noticing the same problem in each. “People want to be creative but spend an enormous amount of time doing admin and not being able to be creative. What if we could build technology that reduces admin and gives creative people more time to create?” 

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The good thing about diving head-first into an emerging medium is that you can end up causing a splash that surprises both you and your potential customers. That’s exactly what happened to tech enthusiast turned indie game studio founder Ryan Bousefield. Having dabbled in virtual reality, he eventually took it upon himself to create his own short interactive horror experience. Despite lasting just five minutes, it was nail-biting enough to wow early VR adopters and became a viral success, ultimately paving the way for him to create an entire company.  

“At that time, VR interactions were mainly going for novelty rather than putting someone in a position where you can tell a story and make them feel a person’s predicament,” says Bousfield of the VR scene of a few years back, one which was mainly dominated by simulators. “We went straight in on horror because we wanted to bring that visceral enjoyment to VR.”  

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