Philip Smith is a New Zealand film and television writer and producer. He is the founder and owner of Australasian media company,

Great Southern Television Great Southern Television (GSTV) is a television production company primarily based in Auckland, New Zealand. The company produces television for the domestic and international markets - including factual, light entertainment, drama and document ...

, with offices in Sydney, Auckland and Queenstown. Smith was awarded the Independent Producer of the Year Award by the Screen Production and Development Association. In 2018 he was named New Zealand Drama Writer of the Year, for the telemovie Why Does Love at the NZTV Awards. In 2020, he co-created the NZ drama, One Lane Bridge, which screens in 28 countries, including AMC in the USA and Arte in France. It won Best Drama in NZ in 2021. According to IMDB Smith has created or co-created 70 television series in New Zealand and Australia, making him Australasia's leading television creative. He was previously a journalist at the

New Zealand Herald ''The New Zealand Herald'' is a daily newspaper published in Auckland, New Zealand, owned by New Zealand Media and Entertainment, and considered a newspaper of record for New Zealand. It has the largest newspaper circulation of all newspapers ...

. He left to join the

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

where he worked as a foreign correspondent from war-plagued nations including Burundi and Rwanda . He was the Financial Times correspondent based in Tanzania, East Africa. Smith was later a journalist at

TVNZ , type = Crown entity , industry = Broadcast television , num_locations = New Zealand , location = Auckland, New Zealand , area_served = Nationally (New Zealand) and some Pacific Island nations such as the Cook Islands, Fiji, and the So ...

and broke the "Bad Blood Scandal" - an award-winning news investigation. He was the presenter of the Wednesday Wire at Auckland's student radio station BFM for three years. He worked for TVNZ in London and covered the Romanian revolution and also reported from Hungary. He won a New York Film and Television Award for his reporting on the Vulcan volcano eruption in Papua New Guinea. He was the bass player in alternative band This Nations Dreaming which won single of the year in 1990. Smith formed his first television company Uplink Sport with sports presenter Phillip Leishman. He sold the company to UK based sports marketing company Sportsworld Media. He started up a second television production company,

in 2002 with retailer Sir David Levene. The company produces drama, factual and entertainment shows globally.

Personal life

As of 2006, Smith lived in Queenstown with his wife, Leanne Malcolm, a radio and television broadcaster, and their son.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Philip New Zealand businesspeople New Zealand reporters and correspondents Year of birth missing (living people) Living people