Busi­ness Clinic

At a glance:
Strate­gic and Organ­i­sa­tion­al advice on max­imis­ing oper­a­tional work­flows, pipelines, and inter-depart­men­tal effi­cien­cies and col­lab­o­ra­tion.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:
Naïrye Apelian is spe­cialised in pro­vid­ing audit and organ­i­sa­tion­al sup­port tai­lored for the ani­ma­tion and VFX indus­try, with the help and con­tri­bu­tion of inter­nal teams.

She focus­es on enhanc­ing oper­a­tional work­flows, opti­mis­ing pro­duc­tion pipelines, and ensur­ing seam­less col­lab­o­ra­tion between departments.

Busi­ness Tips:

— Improve Your Organ­i­sa­tion : Con­duct in-depth audits to stream­line your work­flows, boost inter­de­part­men­tal com­mu­ni­ca­tion, and enhance over­all effi­cien­cy in pro­duc­tion processes.

— Scale Your Stu­dio Effec­tive­ly : Receive strate­gic guid­ance on scal­ing oper­a­tions, opti­mis­ing resources, and enhanc­ing team man­age­ment to sup­port your studio’s growth with­out com­pro­mis­ing quality.

— Empow­er Your Teams with Train­ing : Equip your team mem­bers with essen­tial skills through tar­get­ed training.

At a glance

Legal exper­tise in IP, licens­ing, and busi­ness affairs for con­tent cre­ation and dis­tri­b­u­tion across enter­tain­ment and tech.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:

Arka­di De Proft is an attor­ney at Pier­stone, a full-ser­vice law firm focused on intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty and tech­nol­o­gy. Licensed in Cal­i­for­nia and pro­vi­sion­al­ly licensed in Bel­gium, Arka­di focus­es on the legal aspects of con­tent cre­ation and dis­tri­b­u­tion, includ­ing com­pa­ny-side busi­ness affairs and IP acqui­si­tion and licens­ing. His clients include pro­duc­tion com­pa­nies, video game devel­op­ers, and manwhaga.

Busi­ness Tips:

— Intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty (IP) rights are the foun­da­tion of any cre­ative or busi­ness project, so it’s impor­tant to make sure you legal­ly own or have per­mis­sion to use all of the mate­r­i­al involved in your project.

— This means nego­ti­at­ing and sign­ing writ­ten agree­ments that clear­ly explain who owns what, how the mate­r­i­al can be used, and who gets what piece of the prof­its thereof.

— There is no stan­dard deal that works for every­one; the terms of any agree­ment will depend on the type of IP and its exist­ing expo­sure and com­mer­cial suc­cess. Get­ting help from some­one who under­stands these deals (and the rel­e­vant indus­try) is vital, since the choic­es you make now will affect your project for years to come.

At a glance

HR sup­port for artists and stu­dios in the audio­vi­su­al sec­tor, with a focus on con­tracts, employ­ment sta­tus, and legal-admin­is­tra­tive guidance.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:
As an HR spe­cial­ist at Amp­lo, Anaïs Pirenne sup­ports cre­ative pro­fes­sion­als with prac­ti­cal ques­tions about work sta­tus (employ­ee, artist sta­tus, free­lance), con­tracts, salaries, and HR man­age­ment. She works close­ly with many stu­dios in the audio­vi­su­al sec­tor, espe­cial­ly in ani­ma­tion, help­ing them with the hir­ing and con­tract­ing of artists and tech­ni­cians, and guid­ing them through the legal and admin­is­tra­tive aspects of their projects. Her expe­ri­ence comes from dai­ly work with both indi­vid­ual artists and pro­duc­tion com­pa­nies across Bel­gium, as well as through pro­fes­sion­al events such as Car­toon Busi­ness or Ani­ma Film Festival.

Busi­ness Tips:
— Think ear­ly about the HR part of your project. Clear con­tracts and the right work sta­tus for your team mem­bers will save time, mon­ey, and prob­lems later.

— Plan your HR bud­get care­ful­ly, make sure it is real­is­tic, and always con­nect it to the legal and fund­ing require­ments of your project.

— Don’t hes­i­tate to ask for advice: good HR plan­ning helps you build a strong team and gives your project a sol­id foundation.

At a glance:

Legal advice on deal mak­ing in Europe and the US, with both tra­di­tion­al pro­duc­tion and new tech­nolo­gies in mind.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:

As a sea­soned attor­ney and legal expert work­ing in the ani­ma­tion sec­tor, with years of expe­ri­ence in both Europe and the US, Stéphane Lieser has cov­ered all aspects of the busi­ness from incep­tion to com­ple­tion and deliv­ery of projects. Today, deal-mak­ing in ani­ma­tion is fas­ci­nat­ing, as it involves inno­v­a­tive tech­nol­o­gy as well as tra­di­tion­al pro­duc­tion meth­ods. Legal and busi­ness play­ers must be up to this challenge.

Busi­ness Tips:

— Bal­anc­ing of inter­ests between authorship/​creation and the business/​market: always keep this equi­lib­ri­um in mind.

— No hand­shake deals. Always for­malise your agree­ment to secure you rights.

— The chain-of-title (« cot ») and prop­er insur­ance cov­er­age are two ele­ments to con­sid­er when nego­ti­at­ing a new ani­ma­tion project.

At a glance:

Advice on media financ­ing, project bud­get­ing and nav­i­gat­ing tax incen­tives, espe­cial­ly in Belgium.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:

Olja Rudic is the co-founder of Bright­side Media Group, Flan­ders’ lead­ing one-stop part­ner for media financ­ing. With over 10 years of expe­ri­ence, more than 1,100 projects financed and over EUR 150 mil­lion raised through tax shel­ter fund­ing, the group’s com­pa­nies sup­port pro­duc­ers and cre­ative mak­ers by pro­vid­ing access to tax shel­ter financ­ing, prod­uct place­ment and (co-)production ser­vices for both audio­vi­su­al and live enter­tain­ment projects. They also offer expert con­sul­tan­cy in project account­ing and financ­ing structures.

At Car­toon Busi­ness, Olja will share tar­get­ed advice on key issues such as project bud­get­ing, fund­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties and nav­i­gat­ing tax incen­tives, par­tic­u­lar­ly the Bel­gian tax shel­ter mea­sure. Her goal is to empow­er par­tic­i­pants with the insights they need to suc­cess­ful­ly man­age their projects in an evolv­ing indus­try landscape.

Busi­ness Tips:

The ani­ma­tion indus­try is known for its inno­va­tion and abil­i­ty to think beyond con­ven­tion­al paths. Olja believes that this mind­set should be extend­ed to man­ag­ing financ­ing options and bud­get­ing as well. 

— Don’t lim­it your­self to tra­di­tion­al fund­ing sources; explore alter­na­tive avenues, part­ner­ships, and tax incen­tives that can sup­port your cre­ative projects. 

— Embrace flex­i­bil­i­ty and bold­ness in your finan­cial plan­ning to nav­i­gate the ever-evolv­ing land­scape of animation—after all, ​“Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”

At a glance:

Media finance con­sul­tants, pro­vid­ing project sup­port & out-sourced finan­cial man­age­ment. Spe­cial­is­ing in max­imis­ing cash­flow & advis­ing over­seas Stu­dios, look­ing to work/​set up in France, to take advan­tage of the avail­able subsidies.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:

A&P is a finan­cial con­sul­tan­cy ded­i­cat­ed to the cre­ative and cul­tur­al indus­tries.
We pro­vide tai­lored sup­port for projects—including financ­ing plans and budgets—as well as out­sourced finan­cial man­age­ment (CFO part-time) and ad hoc assignments.

Our exper­tise focus­es on the sector’s key pillars:

Busi­ness Tips:

— Under­stand the dif­fer­ence between account­ing and cash man­age­ment to avoid unpleas­ant surprises. 

— Set up report­ing and man­age­ment con­trol tools.

— Con­trol the legal chain right from the devel­op­ment stage to avoid los­ing out on the poten­tial rev­enue gen­er­at­ed (this has already happened!).

— Always think macro and then micro, so as not to rely on a sin­gle project.

At a glance:

Advis­ing ani­ma­tion teams on project pack­ag­ing, pitch readi­ness, dis­tri­b­u­tion, and Web3-enabled com­mu­ni­ty building.

Pre­sen­ta­tion:

At Car­toon Busi­ness, Nea Simone spe­cialis­es in go-to-mar­ket and Film3/​Web3 strat­e­gy for animation—packaging projects for buy­ers while build­ing on-chain fan com­mu­ni­ties that fuel pre-sales and launch. She advis­es on pitch pol­ish, mar­ket readi­ness (decks, trail­ers, bibles, meta­da­ta), dis­tri­b­u­tion (agents, co-pro, win­dow­ing), and fran­chise plan­ning. Cur­rent and recent work spans The Secret of the Moon­stone, The Adven­tures of S.A.P., and The Cas­cades, apply­ing token-enabled engage­ment and rights-safe, on-chain IP workflows.

Busi­ness Tips:

— Design for buy­er fit and fan fly­wheel. Make a skim­ma­ble deck (log­line, hook, audi­ence, comps, budget/​schedule) and a staged out­reach plan with 24–48h fol­low-ups. In par­al­lel, use Film3 tools - allowlist ​“founder pass­es,” col­lectible sto­ry moments, and gat­ed pre­views - to prove demand and de-risk deals.

— Track teas­er KPIs and com­mu­ni­ty growth; pre­pare alter­nate rights/​region packages.

— Build fran­chise pil­lars ear­ly (licens­ing, games, live events) and let on-chain own­er­ship pow­er loy­al­ty, data, and recur­ring revenue.