random rants - banjax blog

Back to square one

After my recent rant about dealing with local bureaucrats, I thought I should post an update. All was not as it seemed...

We had invited two people to our office so that we could try to enthuse them about our project (a DVD feature film we plan to produce this year). They came, they got the pitch, they seemed 'on side', but a day later an email arrived that read like it was putting us back to square one (off the board actually!) This prompted my earlier post. I emailed a response, when I had calmed down, tackling every issue that was raised and then some. I got a call. It had all been a ghastly misunderstanding (!), they were 'on side' when they left the meeting, but when they went back to their office, their boss slammed the brakes on. Don't ask me why. In any case, we seem to be back where we started i.e. about to submit an application for financial support not knowing whether they really want to help or not.

Time will tell.

Give me a break!

Have you ever been in a meeting with people you kinda' hope understand what you go through in setting up and running a high profile business only to go away slightly depressed that don't seem to share your enthusiasm?

Happened to me today.

My company Banjax has been developing TV and feature film animation projects and trying to raise money for them for the past three years. We have been relatively successful at this and hope to be in production this year on several million pounds (not dollars!) of production. We have brought partners in the US and Canada to the table. We have two large US networks wanting to work with us. We have a range of distributors and broadcasters wanting to get on board. This should be good news.

We have travelled the world (Spain, India, France, Germany, Canada, US etc) to do this. We have had huge marketing & selling costs, development costs, technical costs (animation is at the cutting edge of technology now - large files, rendering etc.), training costs. In the process the people at the end of the queue are always the business founders - little or no salary for three years is no joke!

But what do you get when you go to the people you need to help you? A bureaucratic response about how the forms have to be filled in and how everything needs to be considered to see how it fits the criteria. Give me a break! We are bringing money, jobs and talent to Northern Ireland. We are trying to single handedly create an industry here. You think that would give us some brownie points...

It's not as if there are a queue of people lining up to bring high value jobs to Belfast...