Nicolas Atlan, who announced his departure from Splash Entertainment yesterday, has just been named president of animation at Gaumont, as the French prodco looks to expand its toon activities stateside.

Atlan will work alongside Terry Kalagian, who is joining Gaumont as creative VP for animation. Pierre Belaisch, based in Paris, will continue to serve as president of animation, but his focus will remain on European TV series and he will now report directly to Atlan.

Both Atlan and Kalagian will be based in L.A. and will report directly to Gaumont’s Vice CEO Christophe Riandee and CEO Sidonie Dumas.

Atlan, meanwhile, will divide his time between Gaumont’s L.A. and Paris offices. He will also work closely with Cecile Gaget, Gaumont’s president of sales on the movie side, president of Gaumont Television US, Gene Stein, and Erik Pack, Gaumont Television’s president of international distribution.

Atlan and Kalagian join Gaumont, the studio behind F is for Family and Calimero, as the company looks to bolster its US animation activities while also growing an animated feature film division and increasing animated TV output. 

While serving as co-CEO at Splash Entertainment since 2014 (a role he took on when the company was rebranded from Moonscoop), Atlan produced and sold Kulipari: An Army of Frogs to Netflix and the animated feature film Norm of the North to Lionsgate. Atlan first joined Moonscoop in 1994 and worked in its Paris headquarters for 15 years. In 2009, he relocated from the Paris to Moonscoop’s L.A. office, where he oversaw the daily operations of the US studio. 

For her part, Kalagian has spent more than two decades producing new properties for both children and family audiences.  She was most recently VP of business development for Rainmaker Entertainment, and the former Turner exec led acquisitions and co-productions for Cartoon Network US and Boomerang US.