Corbis Launches Brand-Placement Bazaar with Netflix, Sony, Discovery and Others

Corbis Entertainment, the entertainment rights-licensing company owned by Bill Gates, has opened the doors on an online marketplace that at launch offers up to 600 brand-placement opportunities for marketers across an array of studios, networks and distributors.

The company’s Branded Entertainment Network (BEN) offers a first look at brand-integration opportunities via new content, through a partnership with the Producers Guild of America. The BEN listings include TV shows and films in development by Netflix, Discovery Communications, NBCUniversal’s Bravo, Sony Pictures and Amazon.com.

“Through BEN, we are delivering scale, efficiency and measurement science to the world of branded integration,” Corbis CEO Gary Shenk said in announcing the initiative.

BEN provides “the ultimate two-way exchange for building buzz,” added PGA president Mark Gordon. “For producers, it offers an important stream of revenue to bring our creative visions to life, and a way to cross-promote our content in partnerships with prestigious brands.”

Corbis Entertainment is launching BEN after its 2012 acquisition of Norm Marshall & Associates, a provider of entertainment marketing and product placement.

The company said the new marketplace will use a proprietary cost-per-thousand-impressions model to guarantee exposure for placement deals, with data from third-party providers Nielsen and Worldwide Motion Picture Group (MPG).

Ad agency Universal McCann, a unit of IPG Mediabrands, plans to use BEN on behalf of its clients, according to Scott Donaton, global chief content officer for UM and head of UM Studios.

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