Italian production and distribution outfit Fandango, headed by Domenico Procacci, has acquired a 29% stake in Civilian Content, parent company of lottery franchise the Film Consortium and sales company The Works.

Procacci, who paid around £830,000 for the stake, has bought out Civilian founder Richard Thompson who no longer holds a stake in the company.

Meanwhile, Civilian managing director Chris Auty has acquired 250,000 shares in the company at 7.5p a share. The purchase takes his stake to 0.67% of the issued share capital of the company.

Procacci's dynamic Italian outfit is the regular production partner of Gabriele Muccino, whose latest film Remember Me will screen in the World Cinema section at this month's Sundance film festival. The film is being sold by Civilian Content owned The Works.

At Venice this year, Fandango acquired Italian rights to Michael Winterbottom's Code 46, also sold by The Works.

Fandango has also been busy extending its reach onto the international stage in recent years. Fandango has produced a string of films in Australia since 1993, and last year launched Fandango Australia. The first project to be produced through the company was Rolf de Heer's Alexandra's Project.