BondIt: Film Finance Made Simple

by ScreenCraft - updated on January 23, 2017

Today's guest post is written by Matthew Helderman, CEO and Founder of BondIt, a Santa Monica, California based specialty lender in the film and media sector. Since inception, BondIt has led the financing on over 150 feature film, television, and new media projects, ranging from micro-budget to studio-level projects. BondIt is also ScreenCraft's partner for the Short Film Production Fund.

I founded BondIt in January of 2014 after being frustrated over the lack of easy to use, easy to find and transparent financing options in the feature film business. As a producer, I had long struggled (20+ features at that time) in figuring out how to get projects off the ground and assure the access to financing needed to get through production (let alone make a return for my investors!).

BondIt started as a simple idea: providing loans against SAG-AFTRA union deposits (the deposit held by the guild to assure talent payments and then returned after production wraps) to remove the bottlenecking of cash on hand for producers on lower budget films. In the past three years BondIt has evolved into a full scale media financing fund (a broad term that I’ll address specifically below) participating in over 150+ feature film and television financing deals.

The simple fact is this: 5,000+ films will be made this year and unless a single high-net-worth individual backer is financing the project outright chances are debt financing is being used on the vast majority of these projects. Further, BondIt has grown a track record of being the best partner possible with an open door policy allowing writers, producers and executives to submit projects from around the world spanning budget, genre and development stage.

Deal Track Record 2014 - 2017

During our first year of operation we covered 75+ feature film union deposits — pioneering an entirely new way for producers to access capital: borrowing against their union deposits.

As we continued funding producers union deposit needs it became apparent that the access to capital was much greater in scope than simply the SAG-AFTRA union deposits we were offering.

Today BondIt has become an industry leading finance company offering flexible options for producers ranging from $20K - $10M capital needs across the full spectrum of media debt financing options including:

Union deposits — SAG, DGA, IATSE and international union deposits alike.
Tax credits — Domestic and international jurisdictions for refunds and rebates.
Minimum Guarantees / pre-sales — Distributor and sales company MG’s can be banked at BondIt.
Corporate financing deals — Whether a production, post, sales or new media company - BondIt can offer the working capital needs regardless of size.
Gap financing — banking the international pre-sales numbers along with funding a loan against the unsold territories - BondIt can assist in projects ranging from $3M - $50M.

BondIt EDU Video Series Launch

This past week we launched the BondIt EDU Video Series providing a thorough and visual overview of the often confusing media financing process.

We invite you (whether you’re a producer, writer, director, executive, or just curious about the fragmented film financing landscape and process) to learn more about the ever changing media financing world and look forward to speaking with you soon.