Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. (commonly known as Alliance Atlantis) was a media company that operated primarily as a specialty service provider in Canada. Primarily based in Toronto, Alliance Atlantis also had offices in Halifax, Los Angeles, London, Dublin, Madrid, Barcelona, Shannon, and Sydney.
Alliance Atlantis was the result of a merger of two companies: Atlantis Communications, founded in 1978 by Michael MacMillan, Janice L. Platt and Seaton S. MacLean, and Alliance Communications, founded in 1984 by Stephen Roth, Denis Héroux, John Kemeny, Robert Lantos, Andras Hamori and Susan Cavan as Alliance Entertainment. Alliance Communications and Atlantis Communications merged to form Alliance Atlantis in 1998 which was a member of the North American Broadcasting Association (NABA).
The company ceased to exist in 2007 as the broadcasting division was acquired by Canwest Global Communications and an affiliate of Goldman Sachs that year. The motion picture division was then spun off and operated independently as Alliance Films, headquartered in Montreal (subsequently sold to Entertainment One and later, Lionsgate), and the international television distribution division was sold to Echo Bridge Entertainment.
All of the former Alliance Atlantis specialty networks, except for the now-defunct BBC Kids, are now owned by Corus Entertainment. The films division was later acquired by Entertainment One group and folded into eOne on January 9, 2013. Most of the assets of eOne, which included Alliance Atlantis' films division and television library, were later acquired by Lionsgate on December 27, 2023.
The Alliance name survived under the Alliance Cinemas banner until January 1, 2021; the theaters under the chain are now owned by Cineplex Entertainment.
Formation and history On July 20, 1998, Canadian production companies Alliance Communications and Atlantis Communications announced plans to merge their operations under a single company, Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. The deal was fully closed on September 21. As President and Board Director of the subsequent combined Alliance Atlantis, Lewis Rose was responsible for leading the teams which arranged the merger financing of $545 million and which achieved in excess of $20 million in savings and synergies from the combination of the two companies in the year following the merger. (The merger was also parodied on Made in Canada, when that show's Pyramid Productions merged with a company called Prodigy.) After the merger, the company laid off 15% of their staff (much of them from pre-merger Alliance), and closed the former Atlantis sales office in Amsterdam. As part of the merger deal, Robert Lantos, founder of Alliance, signed a deal for film and TV production with Alliance Atlantis through his own firm, Serendipity Point Films.
At the time of the merger, both companies had launched various Canadian specialty television services; in 1995, Alliance launched Showcase Television while Atlantis launched Life Network (which has since been renamed "Slice"); in fall 1997 the companies launched History Television and HGTV Canada respectively. Earlier that year, Alliance Atlantis teamed up with Hallmark Cards to create Crayola Kids Adventures, a series of three direct-to-video adaptations of well-known children's novels. Atlantis had also been a major investor in YTV in its first few years before selling out to Shaw Communications and later, Corus Entertainment from 1999.
In 1998, the company purchased 75% of Cineplex Odeon Films. In 1999, German-based distributor Kinowelt took a 20% stake in the company alongside a 50% in their UK distribution arm Alliance Atlantis Releasing, which was renamed to Momentum Pictures in 2000. Also that year, the company secured the Canadian rights to distribute features by Destination Films. Also in 2000, it purchased the rights to CSI: Crime Scene Investigation from Disney's Touchstone Television. Another major deal in 2000 was a renewal of their distribution pact with Artisan Entertainment, including Canadian distribution of Artisan material, and UK theatrical distribution of Artisan films via Momentum Pictures.
The company expanded its business with its launch of its children's production label AAC Kids in 1999, and its nonfiction production label, AAC Fact in 2000. These labels were dissolved in 2003.
In April 2000, AAC Kids signed a European co-financing and distribution deal with German studio TV-Loonland AG. The distribution deal was valued at $14 million.
In July 2000, three months before Alliance Atlantis launched AAC Fact, Alliance Atlantis entered the documentary & nonfiction programming by acquiring independent producer and distributor Great North Communications for C$6 million. The acquisition of Great North had given Alliance Atlantis their own documentary and nonfiction production division.
In 2001, the company purchased Salter Street Films, which produced a number of television shows for both the Canadian and international market. However, soon after the acquisition, Salter Street was disbanded and its active projects were transferred to Alliance Atlantis' own television production/development division.
Citing lower profits, Alliance Atlantis later closed the majority of its production arm, aside from the highly profitable CSI: Crime Scene Investigation family of series, which it co-produces with CBS Television Studios. It briefly maintained Salter Street's long-running This Hour Has 22 Minutes before transferring the show to the Halifax Film Company, made up of former Salter Street employees. Its primary business became its ownership of a number of Canadian specialty services, which, in addition to those listed above, later included Food Network, Discovery Health (now FYI Canada), BBC Canada, BBC Kids and more.
Throughout the years, the company had purchased assets of several bankrupt studios, including Norstar Entertainment, Telescene, Peace Arch, Cinemavault, Odeon Films and in 2005, had bought out the television library of Fireworks Distributing Corporation from CanWest Global Communications.
In 2007, Alliance Atlantis was named one of Canada's Top 100 Employers, as published in Maclean's magazine, the only broadcaster to be included on the list.
Sale to CanWest / Goldman Sachs On December 20, 2006, the company announced that it was "exploring strategic alternatives", effectively putting the company up for sale. Expected bidders included Canwest Global, Corus Entertainment, Astral Media, and Rogers Communications. The rights to CSI were expected to be sold separately, with CBS Paramount Television as the most likely bidder. A similar announcement was made previously regarding the Motion Picture Distribution unit, which is also expected to be sold separately while finding a bidder to acquire most parts of the company.
On January 10, 2007, it was announced that Alliance Atlantis would be acquired by a consortium of Canwest Global and Goldman Sachs Alternatives.
The Entertainment and Production division, consisting mainly of AAC's 50% stake in the lucrative CSI franchise, was acquired by Goldman Sachs Alternatives. CBS Paramount TV gained Alliance Atlantis' international distribution rights to the programs. These assets are now owned by Lionsgate Television as of 2024. Alliance Atlantis' international television distribution operations were sold by Goldman Sachs Alternatives to Echo Bridge Entertainment. Motion Picture Distribution LP, including its publicly traded income fund, was acquired by Canada-based EdgeStone Capital Partners and Goldman Sachs Alternatives. On January 15, 2008, Edgemont's 51% voting stake (and 38.5% equity stake) in the Alliance label was purchased by Société générale de financement du Québec, an investment agency of the provincial government. Since the breakup, the company's films have been distributed under the "Alliance" banner for English-language releases and "Alliance Vivafilm" for French-language releases until the sale of the company to eOne. The Broadcasting division was jointly acquired by Canwest and Goldman Sachs Alternatives, with the former owning a majority voting interest and the latter a majority of the equity. Canwest owns 66.67% and GS owns 33.32% of CW Media, the holding company for the former AAC channels. Initially, Canwest still managed the channels it owned before the merger separately. It was expected that the Canwest and CW Media broadcasting divisions would eventually be merged, potentially also giving GS a sizable interest in Global and other Canwest channels (these plans became moot after Canwest's creditor protection filings).
Ramifications Following Canwest seeking creditor protection in late 2009, Shaw Communications subsequently took over most of Alliance Atlantis's former broadcasting assets as of October 27, 2010. after CRTC approval for the sale was announced on October 22. Alliance Atlantis (CW Media) became part of the Shaw Media division. Corus Entertainment acquired Shaw Media on April 1, 2016.
Entertainment One would later acquire Alliance Films on January 9, 2013, and all of their subsidiaries from Goldman Sachs, similar to the purchase of Maple Pictures a year prior. eOne subsequently adopted the 2004 Alliance Atlantis fanfare, still in use by Alliance Films, for their own logo. On November 20, 2014, Echo Bridge Entertainment sold Alliance Atlantis' children's programs, including the international distribution rights to the Degrassi franchise, to DHX Media. In 2017, producer Steven Paul announced that he would acquire the non-family assets of Echo Bridge Entertainment, including the international distribution rights to Alliance Atlantis' library (with the exception of its children's programs that are still owned by DHX Media/WildBrain) and later folded it into SP Releasing, in turn licensed most of Alliance Atlantis, Cineplex Odeon Films, Echo Bridge and PM Entertainment libraries to FilmRise for digital distribution and online streaming. eOne in turn was acquired by U.S. toy maker Hasbro in 2019. On August 3, 2023, Hasbro announced that it would sell most of eOne's assets, including the copyrights and Canadian distribution rights to the library of Alliance Atlantis, to Lionsgate (which Hasbro attempted to acquire in 2017). The deal closed on December 27, 2023.
Assets Broadcasting Channels marked in bold lettering indicates Alliance Atlantis was the managing partner.
Specialty channels BBC Canada (80%) (now defunct) BBC Kids (80%) (now defunct) Discovery Health Canada (80%) (Later FYI Canada, now defunct) Fine Living Canada (80.24%) (later replaced by DIY Network Canada and Magnolia Network - replaced by the Rogers version in 2025) Food Network Canada (57.58%, now Flavour Network) HGTV Canada (80.24%, now Home Network) History Television (now History Canada) IFC Canada (now defunct) National Geographic Channel Canada (80%) Showcase Showcase Action (now Action, later replaced by Adult Swim) Showcase Diva (now Lifetime Canada) Slice Historia (50%) with Astral Media. One (37.77%) (now owned by ZoomerMedia) SCREAM (49%) (now defunct; last known as Dusk, later became ABC Spark) with Corus Entertainment owning the other stake Séries+ (50%) with Astral Media owning the other stake Score Media Inc. (25.93%) HARDtv (now Playmen TV) OutTV The Score (now Sportsnet 360)
Websites BlogTV (Now defunct, merged with YouNow)
Proposed but never launched Adventure One (devoted entirely to documentary and human-interest programming that pushes the boundaries of exploration and adventure. It will not only celebrate adventure but also use the excitement of adventure programming as a vehicle to explore and explain the deeper issues of conservation and earth and cultural sustainability that underline the important work and mission of the National Geographic Society) Aviation TV (dedicated to all aspects of flight and aviation including airplanes and flyers)