The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), France Télévisions and the European Association of Animation Film (CARTOON) are renewing a co-development financing initiative they launched in 2023 to provide one or two animated projects from Cartoon Forum with development funding.

Last year’s winners—Creative Conspiracy’s Ray & Ruby and Fleng Entertainment’s Pig & Andersen—shared roughly US$140,000, but the EBU hasn’t disclosed how much money will be offered this year.  

Public broadcasters/EBU members ponying up to the fund in 2024 are France Télévisions, the BBC (UK), ARD/SWR (Germany), DR TV (Denmark), VRT (Belgium), RTVE (Spain), YLE (Finland), RTÉ (Ireland), RAI (Italy), LTV (Latvia), NPO (Netherlands), RTP (Portugal), SVT (Sweden), Suspilne Media (Ukraine) and RTVS (Slovakia). Suspilne Media (formerly UA) is the only new EBU member involved this year, and NRK Norway has elected to not participate again.

At Cartoon Forum 2024, the participating broadcasters will initially select 10 pitches from this year’s 75 presenting projects, and then narrow the list down to one or two finalists. The winning project(s) must deliver pilots by September 2025, at which point the group will decide if they want to move ahead with commissioning.

Ray & Ruby (52 x 11 minutes, pictured left) from Belgium’s Creative Conspiracy is about two courageous mouse twins and their adventures in a giant castle; while Danish prodco Fleng Entertainment’s Pig & Andersen (52 x 11 minutes, pictured right) is a comedy-driven adaptation of classic Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales.