Eric Garnet
Creating a successful IP for children is a hard task in the dynamic and crowed audiovisual world we are living in, but GO-N Productions got it. Animated preschool series "Simon" will have a fifth season and its global success is unstoppable. "'Simon' is not only in the top 5 of all channels, it's also number 1 in the app, and that is very important because it shows that it's the most requested show by children," affirmed Eric Garnet, President of GO-N Productions. "This is very important also for marketers because it's a very good and positive sign of the attachment and the popularity of 'Simon' among kids, which is the base on which we are building the licensing and merchandising next step," he commented.
In order to create a 360 strategy around "Simon", GO-N has a few agents in several countries. "Now with season 5, we can guarantee a large volume of episodes on each channel and a long-lasting on-air presence, which is very important for licensing purposes," admitted Garnet. "It's great to give us more possibilities to develop the IP, not only in Europe, but also in China and Korea, where Simon is very popular," he said.
GO-N is also working on a co-production with DeAPlaneta named "Monster Shaker" (52×13’) that will be released at MIPCOM. The TV series is an adaptation of the books by Mr Tan and Mathilde Domecq and tells the story of 9-year old Justin discovers his grandfather’s old shaker. This fabulous object allows him to create extraordinary, and extraordinarily crazy creatures with incredible powers, but it must be kept secret, no matter what, in case it falls into the wrong hands. "This is a great work relationship with DeAPlaneta team, it's a very smooth, generous and positive process, we are very glad and we are also thinking of doing more projects together," Garnet asserted.
On the other hand, GO-N has pitched a new project called "Annette, Apprentice Witch" (52x11’) based on a French comic book "Aneth, Apprentie Sorcière” from Elodie Shanta. "It's a very funny sitcom targeting kids from 6 to 9 produced by Anne de Galard and me," said Garnet. GO-N has been recognized as Producer of the Year in Cartoon Forum.
NEW ERA
Recently, GO-N Productions has joined to Federation Studios, becoming part of a group of 35 production companies in France and globally, each of them spearheaded by independent producers with their own unique editorial direction.
Thanks to the additional GO-N content (11 series totaling 250 half hours of premium animation), the Federation Kids & Family (Federation’s production and distribution kids division) enhanced catalogue now boasts over 730 half-hours of kids animation and live-action programming.