Alexandre Isard A lot was riding on the meeting at JP Morgan. It was March 2015, and Pierre-Antoine Capton needed to convince a room filled with 40 bankers and lawyers that they should back Mediawan, a French company he believed could one day be Europe’s answer to the Hollywood conglomerates. Capton, a successful television producer, had been enlisted by telecom billionaire Xavier Niel and banker Matthieu Pigasse to raise $300 million for the new venture, despite the fact that he had no background in finance. For Niel and Pigasse, the idea was simple: raise capital through an IPO, make one major acquisition, cash out and move on. But Capton had different plans.
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