10 Mexican Mart Full of Dramas, Micro-Dramas and Vertical Makeovers (Continued on Page 12) MIP Cancun opened on November 19, 2025 with a mini drama. No, literally, the annual TV market in Cancun, Mexico started with a conference on the popularity of micro-dramas, with Spain-based The Mediapro Studio’s Juan Acosta, Turkeybased Inter Medya’s Can Okan, and Shawn Wu from China’s COL Group taking to the stage to talk about the phenomenon. The following day, micro-dramas returned as the topic of another conference. Now it remains to be seen if this type of content can move any time soon from the first-floor location, where MIP Cancun’s conference talks are held, to the second-floor location of the MIP Cancun market, where inspired talks turn into business deals. Reps for RX, the France-based firm that organizes the market, reported that, on November 21, 2025, “MIP Cancun wrapped a vibrant four days of deal-making at the Moon Palace Cancun [Resort].” In addition, RX stated that its content and co-production market for the Latin American and U.S. Hispanic television industry “concluded its 12th edition with a strong attendance of 800 distributors, buyers, producers, commissioners, creators and brands from 47 countries. [There were] 250 buyers and commissioners (up from last year’s 221), [and] a total of 121 distributors (up from 115 in 2025).” It was also announced that the 13th edition of MIP Cancun will run November 17-20, 2026 at the same Moon Palace Hotel Convention Center. Exhibitors are now hoping that some of the pre-scheduled meetings at MIP Cancun will turn into sales agreements at January’s Miami, Florida-based Content Americas, a much larger market with over 600 content buyers, and when the depleted November budgets are refurbished. The Mexican MIP market also got good report card grades from the U.S. studios. Commented Luciana Santacruz from the Miami office of NBCUniversal: “We [were] delighted to attend MIP Cancun this year. This market continues to be one of the most valuable markets for our LatAm clients and it’s a great opportunity to present some of NBCUniversal’s top new series, like PONIES, and Telemundo’s new series Lobo.” Other studios also exhibiting with tables included Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox, Paramount, and Sony Pictures. On a colorful note, Fox Entertainment Global’s exhibition table was manned by the newly recruited Sabrina Hall Aguirre, next to that of her mother, Fremantle’s Sheila Hall Aguirre. Also, a Sony Pictures coordinator was very busy setting up breakfasts and lunches for the studios’ sales team at various restaurants at the resort, even bringing the studio’s own branded napkins. Other than that, the first thing most people noticed when arriving in Mexico by air for the MIP Cancun TV market was the large number of Canadian tourists. Nearly 10 large busses awaited the Canucks at the Cancun airport, many of whom opted to vacation in the Mexican resort town as opposed to spending their tourist dollars in Florida as a reaction to the Trump administration’s antagonism toward Canada. There was also the fact that, this year, not all content buyers were invited to MIP Cancun all expenses paid. Some buyers were, for the first time, asked to pay for part of their participation costs. Returning to the micro-drama explosion, organizers of the three-day market chose to stage two brief conferences about the subject rather than hosting any lengthy sessions. The first event was titled: “Micro Drama, Mega Audience.” For the second event, titled “Powering LatAm’s Micro Drama Boom,” panelists were confirmed just before the market started, and included Sammie Haw and Maritza Castro, both from Crazy Maple Studios, the California-based unit of China’s ICVR. For those viewers who have short attention spans and like to watch TV on their cell phones, Hollywood and, apparently, the rest of the entertainment world, has refined the concept first developed in 2018 by Quibi, a streaming service that was shut down at the end of 2020 by its creator, Jeffrey Katzenberg, after losing $1.75 billion. Today, Hollywood (led by Asia, and followed by LatAm and Europe), is back to banking on short-form dramas of up to 90 minutes transmitted in installments of one-to-three minutes to be displayed vertically on mobile devices. The budgets for micro-dramas are relatively inexpensive, but the shows are popular with young viewers (especially in China), and TV production companies like DramaBox, ReelShort, MicroCo, and GamaTime are all betting on this type of vertical video market, now estimated at $8 billion and expected to reach $25 billion worldwide by 2030. The micro-drama business utilizes the freemium model, where the first few episodes are free, and the rest are by subscription, via purchase, or with ads. The Mediapro Studio’s Juan Acosta, Inter Medya’s Can Okan, and Shawn Wu from China’s COL Group “MIP Cancun started as a complementary event, mainly focused on networking with smaller players. Today, it offers outstanding attendance quality, strong sessions, and presentations that combine an attractive format with a manageable pace.” — Michelle Wassermann, Banijay Rights VIDEOAGE January 2026 MIP Cancun Report
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