EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures Television has quietly taken full control of The Crown producer Left Bank Pictures in a deal worth £5.5M ($6.6M).
Sony has acquired the 5.32% of Left Bank it did not own, valuing the production house at £103M ($124M) around 15 years after it first launched in the UK.
The deal was completed last June but was disclosed for the first time in two sets of Left Bank earnings published this week on Companies House, the register of British companies.
Deloitte, the consultancy giant, was engaged to value the Left Bank shares held by employees including Andy Harries, the producer’s founder and chief executive.
Sony first invested in Left Bank in 2012, four years before The Crown streamed on Netflix. The company is currently shooting the sixth and final season of the lavish royal drama.
Left Bank has a complicated corporate structure and its earnings are split out over several subsidiaries. Left Bank Pictures Television, the parent company of special-purpose vehicles for The Crown, reported revenue of £147.8M ($177.5M) in the year to March 2022. This was an increase of 1,101% on the previous year’s revenue of £12.5M ($15M) when The Crown was on a gap year.
Left Bank Pictures Television’s pre-tax profit stood at £14M ($16.8M) last year compared with a loss of £2M ($2.4M) in 2021, according to the financial document.
Sony and Left Bank declined to comment.
