Time Warner buys Shed Media

Time Warner is to buy a controlling interest in the British super-indie Shed Media, the company behind shows such as Supernanny and Waterloo Road, in a deal that values the company at £100m.

The US company will take a 55.75% stake, with Shed management holding 21.37% and the remainder owned by other key staff.

Shed, which owns independent producers including Wall to Wall, Ricochet and Twenty Twenty, confirmed in June that "certain members" of its management were in discussions with a Time Warner subsidiary, Warner Bros Entertainment.

Warner Bros had hired Tiger Aspect's managing director, Andrew Zein, with a remit to expand its international production business by buying key UK independent producers and talent.

The Shed deal is a premium of 73% on the share price on the last day before the start of the offer period, Warner Bros said, adding that around 73% of Shed shareholders had undertaken to back the deal.

Ronald Goes, the Warner Bros head of international TV production, said: "The UK is an important television market, with a robust, thriving local production sector.

"The acquisition of Shed provides Warner Bros Television Group with immediate scale in UK production and complements our existing television production and distribution businesses."

The deal will make multimillionaires, on paper at least, of Shed Media's senior management. Some executives have already made millions through Shed making acquisitions of its own in the past, such as Alex Graham, who sold his indie Wall to Wall to the company in 2007 for £20m.

Under the new ownership structure Shed's management team, which comprises 16 executives who currently hold a total of 55.4% of the equity, will control 21.37%.

This means that senior management – which includes Shed's current biggest shareholders Graham and Nicholas Powell, founder of Supernanny producer Ricochet, who hold about 12% each, co-founder Eileen Gallagher and chief executive Nick Southgate – are on paper worth more than a combined £21m if the deal goes through as structured.

The remaining 22.88% stake is being split between a group of 27 other key senior employees. In addition 2.75% worth of shares will be set aside to be offered to "new joiners" in the future.

"In Warner Bros Television Group we have found the right partner to support Shed's development and future growth strategy," said Southgate. "It has an unrivalled reputation both creatively and in international distribution and my management team are excited about being in the vanguard of the Warner Bros Entertainment initiative to build on its international production network."

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