Colex Enterprises was a joint venture between Columbia Pictures Television and LBS Communications, Inc., active from January 30, 1984 to December 31, 1987. The name of the joint venture is a portmanteau of the two companies' names (Columbia and Lexington, the latter coming from LBS' original name of Lexington Broadcast Services).[1] It came after Columbia and LBS agreed to distribute the TV show Family, which LBS distributed under license from Columbia Pictures Television.[2][3] Family was then added to Colex's roster when the company formed, and the first new show added to Colex's roster was the show Gidget. It was designed to handle syndication of barter series on an advertised-supported basis, mostly of obscure TV shows that never made it into syndication before.[4]
Colex was split into five branches in November 1985, which were Colex First-Run, which distributed new material, such as The New Gidget, The Hollywood Reporter and The New Monkees, Colex Premiere Movies, which distributed several movies and telemovies, The Colex Collection, which handled distribution of newer off-network product, The Colex 3-Pack, which consisted of mini-series and The Colex Classics, which would continue distribution of several shows.[5]
The company was responsible for distributing the Screen Gems television output, with the exception of pre-1967 Hanna-Barbera produced programs, as well as many of the post-1947 Bob Hope theatrical output.