NBCU Telemundo launches dedicated Latino streaming scripted studio

Marcos Santana

NBCUniversal-owned Telemundo Enterprises is launching a new studio dedicated to creating content for Latino audiences on streaming services.

Telemundo Streaming Services, part of Telemundo Global Studios, will be based in Miami in the US and led by its parent’s president Marcos Santana, who will continue to oversee all original scripted productions for the Telemundo network and other platforms, including international co-productions.

The studio is launching with more than 35 projects in development and production, with a focus on developing and producing Spanish-language scripted content for Hispanic viewers. Its output includes the dramedy Armas de Mujer for Peacock and El Marginal seasons four and five for Netflix, as well as a remake of Historia De Un Clan, upcoming seasons of El Recluso, a new version of El Diario De Un Gigolo and the action series El Immortal.

Late last year, Telemundo Enterprises restructured its senior exec team to focus on its streaming services in a move designed to expand the company’s capacity to produce original content for streaming platforms, and following the merging of NBCU’s streaming and network divisions under Mark Lazarus.

Telemundo has been a leading provider of scripted Spanish-language content to direct-to-consumer platforms since 2011, having delivered over 14,000 hours of original content to partners like Netflix, HBO, Hulu and Movistar, including 3,000 hours to Peacock when it launched last year.

The company says that Telemundo Streaming Studios will expand Telemundo’s market presence by producing streaming content to reach the diversity of Latinos across language and age.

“As the premier media company serving Hispanics in the US, Telemundo is shaping a new era in Hispanic media with the creation of the first-of-its-kind streaming studio,” said Beau Ferrari, chairman of NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises.

“Latinos are pacesetters of cultural and technological change. We are the leading Hispanic media company super serving the Latinos of today with the best original, premium and culturally relevant content across all platforms.”

Santana added: “We are thrilled to open a new state-of-the-art studio designed from its inception to produce premium content featuring world-class producers and award-winning Hispanic talent across the United States, Mexico, Colombia, Spain and Argentina.”

Earlier this year, Telemundo Enterprises hired ViacomCBS International’s former streaming chief Ezequiel Fonseca Zas and A+E Networks’ Malu Carmona-Botana to expand its global distribution activities, while Telemundo Global Studios’ VP of development & production Fernando Gaston departed to become VP of content for ViacomCBS International Studios in the Americas.