‘Premium dubbing will soon be a thing’
TV+Synchron managing director Jenny Buch on the future of the industry
Earlier this year, Netflix made headlines in the dubbing industry with an AI clause, leading voice actors to go on strike and boycott assignments for the US streaming giant. What does this mean for the industry’s big players? Jenny Buch of TV+Synchron GmbH provides us with a snapshot of the current state and future of the business.
The company provides German accessibility services, including voice-overs, dubbing, audio descriptions, and subtitling for documentaries, feature films, podcasts, and audio books. They also provide translations and dubbing for a well-known YouTuber who offers content in 24 languages. Buch notes that while automation is technically possible today, it results in a significant loss of quality.
A prime example occurred on 1 February 2025 with the Polish crime series Murderesses on Magenta TV. Synthetic sentences were generated using professional actors' sound files under the direction of the Scandinavian firm Viaplay. Buch was shocked by how carelessly the job had been handled by the competition. “A lesson in terrible dubbing,” says Buch. “I don’t see how this managed to get through quality control. Text and audio didn’t align. While the original performance was agitated, the synthetic version sounded flat and devoid of emotion. In the industry, we call this ‘flat’.” Magenta TV pulled the series just two days later. “Standards vary enormously in this business.” In Poland, for example, a single narrator—the so-called lektor—often delivers the entire voice-over, rather than using multiple voices.
In summer 2025, a legal test case around AI made headlines. A YouTuber had generated a voice resembling Bruce Willis without consent and used it in two videos. Manfred Lehmann—the German dubbing voice of the American actor—took legal action and won in the first instance before the Berlin Regional Court, as his voice was clearly recognisable. Based on Lehmann’s hypothetical fee, the YouTuber was ordered to pay 4,000 euros. The Hamburg-based voice actor Jens Wendland was not as lucky. Known from the Uncharted video game series, he took tech company ByteDance to court: “The voice used for Father Christmas closely resembled his own. But how do you prove it really is your voice? He couldn’t do it.” In the German podcast Künstlerische Intelligenz, Wendland and his lawyer Sebastian Deubelli address the issue directly. “When it comes to voice rights, Germany is still lagging behind. In the US, Matthew McConaughey, for example, has had his voice legally protected.” Several audio clips—including the iconic line “Alright, alright, alright” from Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused—are now covered by trademark and patent protection. McConaughey has even commissioned an AI version of his own voice.
A legal review by the Association of German Voice Actors (VDS) has also scrutinised Netflix contracts, finding that key clauses—such as unrestricted usage rights—may be invalid or unlawful under personality, data protection and contract law. Remuneration, too, remains unresolved. But once a settlement is reached, says Buch, “the rest of the streaming platforms will follow.” For companies like TV+Synchron, this has led to increased caution. “People read rights agreements much more carefully now. Many add handwritten notes saying, ‘My voice may not be used for AI’, which isn’t our intention at all. We use AI exclusively for organisational processes, such as automating meeting minutes.”
So what does the crystal ball say? “In the medium term, there will be premium dubbing, still produced in the traditional way—and smaller productions using synthetic voices. At some point, we’ll probably be licensing voices outright, without recording them.” Buch offers seeing the current situation as an opportunity: “For now, we still have the chance to put legal safeguards in place and to decide what we want from AI—and how to preserve what matters most to us: our language, our emotion and our creativity.”
Susanne Gietl for Adlershof Journal