After arriving at Rio de Janeiro on Thursday afternoon (5/24), we visited Globo TV the next morning (5/25).
Globo TV is the No. 1 television network in Latin America and the single largest producer of “telenovelas” (Brazilian soap opera). Owned by Groupo Globo, Globo TV is a family business founded by Roberto Marinho, providing products ranging from music labels, newspapers, to TV series. The business is constructed on “three pillars” — sports, entertainment, and journalism. Morphing from a traditional media conglomerate into a digital player, it has not only upgraded its technology from 4K to 4K HD and even 8K, but also inched into the internet pay TV market. Aside from tech-upgrades, it continues to embed social responsibility into its original contents, addressing issues like alcohol, drugs, human-trafficking and transgender in its telenovelas, truly becoming “a factory of dreams, a window to the world” (promotional video). In the words of its founder, “[they] believe in the dream and [they] build reality”. When asked about the company’s competitive advantage, the host replied, “We are there with our content. We care about what Brazilians want to watch. We have no direct competition because we are original.”
After the introduction, we took a tour to see its studios/sets. The sets were so exquisite and realistic that Xu Yu commented, “I would love to design sets like these in the future.” In fact, she and Miko were so inspired that they decided to create a startup, “Yumi photography”, where one of them would design sets and the other the cameraman.
To conclude the visit, Emily said “the visit is so cool. It offers a behind-the-scenes glimpse into TV production.”
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