The Farm Group

Cavendish Corporate Finance, the UK’s leading sell-side mid-market M&A adviser, has advised The Farm Group, the UK’s leading broadcast post-production company, on its acquisition by major US company, Picture Head. This is Picture Head’s second international acquisition.

Multi-award winning The Farm, which focuses on television and film post-production, was sold by creative transformation company WPP and the Founders, Nicky Sargent and Vikki Dunn, to the California- based Picture Head. The Founders will stay involved in The Farm and will re-invest in the expanded Picture Head business.

Both Founders believe that after two very successful decades, this strategic move will help Picture Head expand in the international ‘post’ market and provide an enhanced combination of technical, creative and professional excellence to the world’s best content creators.

The Farm is the UK’s largest post-production group. Founded in 1998, it has four locations in London, Manchester, Bristol, and Los Angeles. The Farm also operates the in-house post production teams for BBC Sport, multi-channel broadcaster UKTV, and international television content company Freemantle. High profile projects have included Netflix’s Riviera, the BBC’s Baptiste, and ITV’s Downton Abbey.

Having acquired The Farm, Picture Head can now claim to work with a wide range of the biggest programme content providers in the world, including Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Warner Brothers, HBO, CBS, NBC, ITV and the BBC. The expanded business can supply the full range of picture and sound post-production, VFX, content production, and other media services, in the US, the UK and Canada.

The Cavendish team was led by Linda Sullivan, Partner, and Head of Media and Digital.

Linda commented:

“We are delighted to have advised The Farm on this transaction. This deal will further strengthen Picture Head’s already outstanding offering. It will also allow the combined business to further expand internationally and be recognised as the go-to post-production house for the world’s best storytellers and filmmakers. This area of the media sector is growing and ready for further consolidation and M&A activity. We are confident we will see more deals of this nature over the coming year.”