American Film Market Unveils 'The AFM House' Innovation Hub for 2026 Edition
The American Film Market is adding a new venue to its Century City campus this November. IFTA, the organisation behind the AFM — the annual Los Angeles trade fair where producers, sales agents and buyers do the deals that put films on screens — has announced The AFM House, a purpose-built space across from the Fairmont Century Plaza that will host its Innovation Hub (Variety, 12 August 2026).
The venue adds 15,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor space to the market's footprint. Its Innovation Hub is the AFM's dedicated showcase for AI and technology companies working on how films and premium content are created (American Film Market). It will be presented in collaboration with Cannes Next, the Marché du Film's innovation programme, which launched in 2025 and made its debut at the Cannes film market's own edition earlier that year.
The 2026 AFM — the event's 47th edition — runs 10–15 November at the Fairmont Century Plaza. The AFM House itself will be open 11–14 November. This year's market theme is "The New Global Screen Economy," a framing that signals how much the business has shifted since AI and streaming reshaped the pipeline from script to screen.
Two of the figures most closely involved framed the collaboration as a natural bridge between the world's two largest film markets. IFTA president and CEO Jackie Brenneman commented on the launch, and Marché du Film executive director Guillaume Esmiol spoke about the cross-Atlantic partnership, according to Variety. Both organisations had previously signalled the tie-up: an IFTA press release dated September 2025 announced collaboration on the Innovation Hub and AI programming for AFM 2025, laying the groundwork for the expanded 2026 edition (IFTA).
The AFM House will also host The Cinemas Club, an event co-created by the Marché du Film and Cine Group that was introduced at the Cannes 2026 Marché du Film. Julien Marcel, president of Cine Group, commented on bringing the Cinemas Club to the AFM in Los Angeles. The Pitch Conference — Television is expanding as well, with submissions opening 14 August and the session itself set for 13 November, 3:30–6:00 pm (American Film Market).
What makes the AFM House worth noting is the geography it connects. The Marché du Film runs during the Cannes Film Festival in May; the AFM runs in Los Angeles in November. Together they anchor the two annual windows when independent films get financed, sold and distributed across territories. A shared innovation space — backed by both markets — gives the technology companies chasing the film industry a single conversation that spans the full calendar, rather than two separate ones six months apart.
Registration for the 2026 AFM opened on 23 June (American Film Market).
