CANNES, France (AFP) ― Women are reshaping the landscape of TV and digital entertainment as more and more female executives clinch top industry jobs around the world, a shift on full display at this week’s MIPCOM audiovisual trade fair.

Held each year on the French Riviera at the same site as the Cannes Film Festival, MIPCOM brings together the movers and shakers of the global entertainment business to network, talk shop and buy, sell and finance new content.

Women have an increasingly strong presence in the field of more than 10,000 industry insiders who attend ― including in some of the most powerful positions in the entertainment world.

“Times have changed and it’s easier in certain countries for women to rise to the top,” Cecile Frot-Coutaz, newly named chief executive of the global entertainment group FremantleMedia, told AFP as the show got under way.

“Today, there are more women in our business than in other sectors, particularly in the United States and United Kingdom.”

This feminisation of the industry was plain to see from the line-up of keynote speakers addressing the four-day show, which wraps up Thursday.

Nancy Dubac, president of entertainment and media at U.S. heavyweight cable and satellite channel A&E Networks, gave one of the first keynote speeches to a packed auditorium, followed by Andrea Wong, who heads up Sony Pictures Television and Sony Pictures Entertainment.

In a sign of the changing times, 150 top female TV executives came together for the 28-year-old trade fair’s first-ever “Power Lunch”, designed to enable women in entertainment to connect, network and expand business opportunities.