Deluxe's Marie-Laure Barrau answers our questions on her career so far

As General Manager, I oversee our cinema operations in Northern Europe to ensure the success of our customers’ national releases. We

provide mastering and distribution services to distributors, ad agencies, sales agents and rights holders. With over 6,000 cinemas connected to our global network, we are the leader in DCP electronic delivery (e-delivery). Our 13 globally-located facilities provide a managed service to our customers and local support to cinemas.

I have spent most of my career in the audiovisual industry. To sum up my background, I have 20 years of experience in content production and distribution, an entrepreneurial spirit and a passion for cinema, combined with a strong educational background (HEC Paris). Four years ago, I joined Eclair Theatrical Services (ETS) as the Vice President of Sales which was my first job in the cinema industry. I joined the Deluxe family after ETS was acquired by them in November 2021.

Although COVID adversely affected the industry for extended periods of time, it showed that cinema can evolve and it

demonstrated the resilience of our operations and technology. With cinemas closing and reopening, freight volume impacts and delays, and a constantly shifting slate, we were able to quickly adapt and continue to provide services to our customers securely and efficiently. Our technology enabled us to operate remotely when needed, and our global footprint allowed us to balance different workloads - having multiple facilities around the world meant we had the flexibility to pivot and move work around during the changing regional restrictions. This was a huge asset to our customers, particularly when an emergency or a regional COVID-related crisis arose and we were still able to operate.

For the past four years, I have been driven by the will to understand our customers’ needs

and make their lives as easy as possible. This was how I worked with my team on a live broadcast solution via IP, and this work we did was awarded the Innovation Prize from Cesar &

Technique last January. It has been a long term team effort to develop the infrastructure and workflow, and to source the right equipment to set up this service that enables us to stream live content, either from a satellite feed or from IP to IP in multicast.

Along with this great recognition from my peers, I joined the FICAM (Fédération des Industries du Cinéma, de l’Audiovisuel et du Multimédia) in 2020 as VP Feature Film and the AFFIF (Association of Cannes Film Festival) in 2021 as a board member. More recently, I have been selected to be part of the Cesar Academy. I’m pleased to see that diversity in cinema, and especially technical services, is not simply a buzzword, but that concrete actions are being taken and results can be seen.

I don’t have one single favourite thing, there are many, but I’d say, in a rough order: great people, great content, and lots of fun! I am not saying that there is no hard work, but we also have many occasions to celebrate.

What I find to be unique in this industry is that we are never bored - each week, we have to prepare and manage dozens of new releases in each market. There is no other industry where you have such short and long life cycles, where you work on so many different projects and such a variety of content.

Working in technical services we are in between the technical and distribution teams

and we service distributors with the support of exhibitors. I see ourselves as a hidden but

essential link between both.

Cinema is evolving, and COVID has accelerated changes in the way people watch movies and consume content. As with many industries, the business models of our industry are evolving. Looking forward five years is difficult at the moment, but in this changing universe my goal is to stay focused on operational excellence and customer satisfaction, alongside expanding our e-delivery footprint.