Endemol

Endemol is a television production company based in the Netherlands, with subsidiaries and joint ventures in 23 countries, including the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Mexico, Spain, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Netherlands, India, South Africa, Lebanon, Morocco, Philippines, Turkey and Australia among others. It’s controlled by the biggest Italian media company, Mediaset.

History

Endemol was founded in 1994 by a merger of television production companies owned by Joop van den Ende and John de Mol, the name deriving from the combination of their surnames. One notable success has been the Big Brother “reality television” show, with versions in many countries after the initial Dutch version. However the most profitable programme for Endemol is Deal or No Deal which has now been sold to over 100 countries. They specialise in inexpensive programming that is appealing to television executives in the modern multi-channel world, and other Endemol programmes in this vein include Changing Rooms, Ready Steady Cook, Ground Force, International King of Sports, Space Cadets and Fear Factor.

In 2000, the company was sold to the Spanish telecom and media corporation Telefónica for € 5.5 billion. In November 2005, 25% of Endemol was taken public, and is since then listed on the Euronext Amsterdam exchange under the stock symbol EML. On May 14, 2007 the remaining 75% of Endemol shares has been bought by a consortium, Edam Acquisition, led by Mediaset, the company owned by Silvio Berlusconi’s family, and including the investment company Cyrte, whose vast majority of shares is owned by the original co-founder John de Mol. The consortium announced on August 6, 2007, that it now owned 99.54% of Endemol shares, after an offer to buy the remaining shares went through on August 3, 2007; it asked the Euronext bourse for a delisting of Endemol.

In 2008, the company acquired 51 Minds from Cris Abrego and Mark Cronin, producers of several successful reality shows from VH1′s “Celebreality” Block.

Reality television

* Big Brother
* The Big Donor Show
* Star Academy
* Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
* The Games (British TV)
* The Farm (TV series)
* Only Fools on Horses
* There’s Something About Miriam
* Gay, Straight or Taken?
* Kid Nation
* Queen Bees (TV series)

Game shows

* 1 vs. 100
* BrainTeaser
* Break The Bank
* Deal or No Deal
* Eliminator
* Fear Factor
* For the Rest of Your Life
* Golden Balls
* Hotrods
* I Love Money
* In The Grid
* Judas Game
* Midnight Money Madness
* Participation TV
* Set for Life
* Show Me the Money
* Take It or Leave It
* Take the Cake
* Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
* Wipeout

Late night/variety shows

* Cronicas Marcianas
* Games UpLate Live

Children’s shows

* The DJ Kat Show
* Mighty Truck of Stuff
* Bel’s Boys
* Roar!
* Totally Frank
* Emu

Other

* Domino Day

Endemol – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia