As a consultant, Thomas Augsberger has advised some of the largest international media companies, including BBC Films (UK), and Toho Towa (Japan). Currently, Thomas is Munich based Leonine Studios' exclusive North American representative.
Leonine is the result of a roll-up of Germany's Tele München Group (TMG), Universum Film, Wiedemann & Berg, and I & U which were acquired by NY based Hedge Fund KKR and LA based Atwater Capital in May 2019. Thomas had advised TMG for 24 years in all aspects of its North American business and now continues to represent Leonine in North America with regards to its TV and Feature Film licensing-, co-production-, co-financing-, investment-, and library -business. Every year, Leonine licenses 12-15 US feature films and 3-5 US TV series for distribution in the German speaking territories. These licensing deals occur either via output deals with Studios (in the past Thomas negotiated output deals for TMG with Warner Bros., MGM, Summit, Lionsgate) and often on a picture-by-picture and series-by-series basis, frequently during international Film- and TV-markets. For his consulting clients Thomas sources all US deals from identifying target projects from Studios, sales agents, and producers to evaluating the scripts and talent packages to negotiating the deal terms of the license agreements and output deals.
Memorable deals for TMG/Leonine include the acquisition of the Carolco and Mutual Film Co. film libraries, Studio co-financing deals with Paramount for TOMB RAIDER I. & II., equity investments in Lionsgate and Storied Media Group, and licensing deals for Marvel’s IRON MAN Franchise, Paramount's SHUTTER ISLAND, Summit’s TWILIGHT Franchise, Lionsgate’s ongoing JOHN WICK Franchise, and TV series like “Flashpoint”, "Anger Management", and “The Night Manager”.
In 2019, Thomas pre-bought Guy Ritchie’s THE GENTLEMEN from Miramax in Berlin 2019, Roland Emmerich’s MOONFALL from AGC Studios & CAA in Cannes 2019, Rian Johnson’s KNIVES OUT from MRC/Lionsgate in August 2019, Lorena Scafaria’s HUSTLERS from STX in Toronto 2019, and Channing Tatum's & Reid Carolin's THE DOG from FilmNation during AFM 2019.
In 2020, Thomas pre-bought Guy Ritchie's 5 EYES from STX/Miramax, George Miller's 3000 YEARS OF LONGING from FilmNation, ARTHUR from Sierra/eOne, and SHOTGUN WEDDING from Lionsgate.
Other than Leonine, ERM's consulting clients currently include
- ROW8, a PVOD/TVOD and EST platform run by John Calkins, which Augsberger helped launch in June 2019 with the entire new release slate of Paramount, Warner Bros, Universal, Sony, and Lionsgate. STX, MGM and Disney/Fox were added in 2020 ,
- Ideal, an LA and Paris based development & production company owned by French novelist, producer, writer and director Amanda Sthers, and
- Volga Films, one of the most successful Russian all-rights distributors active throughout CIS and the Baltics, founded & run by Sergei Yershov.
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