There are still some substantial New Zealand companies such as Great Southern Film and Television, but foreign firms are believed to get more than half the grants made by NZ On Air.
But some local content is funded direct from networks, with no cash from taxpayers.
In television, the New Zealand production industry has largely become a branch office, where grateful professionals get jobs but the profits flow overseas.
Some argue that ownership is irrelevant, but this is not what was promised at numerous pow-wows between politicians and producers as the idea developed in the 2000s.
For all the talk of retaining profits and growing companies, the New Zealand TV production sector has become reliant on capped taxpayer funding from NZ On Air.
NZ On Air, in turn, is reliant on funding commissions from TV networks who rely on big, experienced production companies, many of which have been bought by overseas firms.
The evolution of Touchdown TV is a case in point.
Touchdown was the ultimate New Zealand production company when it was led by Julie Christie, with an ambitious focus and a sharp eye on margins, making it popular with the TV networks.
Dutch company Eyeworks bought into Touchdown in February 2006, then Eyeworks was bought last year by the US studio Warner Bros TV. It has been a foreign company for many years, but the company symbolically cut ties with the old days this week when it was rebranded as Warner Bros International Television Production.
Likewise, South Pacific Pictures was built up by esteemed producer John Barnett from the former drama department at TVNZ, and produced a strong library of brilliant content - from Shortland Street to Whale Rider to Outrageous Fortune.
Ultimately, South Pacific Pictures was sold to British firm All3Media, which was subsequently bought by a 50:50 joint venture between Discovery Networks and Liberty Global, both with revenue in the billions of dollars.
In 2013, Greenstone, founded in 1994 by former journalist John Harris, which made more than 100 documentaries and series in New Zealand, was purchased by Australian company Cordell Jigsaw Zapruder, known as CJZ.
Meanwhile, Australian-owned Screentime is long established as a player in New Zealand and has had millions of dollars in NZ On Air funding.
In broadcasting, US company Discovery Networks bought Julie Christie's Food and Living channels. She joined the board of MediaWorks, which has long been overseas controlled and was recently bought out by the Los Angeles-based vulture capital firm Oaktree. MediaWorks is now controlled from Oaktree's London office.
None of which is to be critical of those companies or individuals. It is accepted that in a deregulated landscape New Zealanders will at least share in the jobs and training.
But for all the pow-wows over the past decade, the profits - some accrued from taxpayer funding - will flow overseas.
Chinese TV
Film Commission chief executive Dave Gibson can look forward to a "Year Of The Dragon", with burgeoning projects from an NZ-China television co-production deal signed at the end of last year.
New Zealand has been working on closer relations in the screen industry since the turn of the century, but a co-production deal for film several years ago has borne little fruit, so far.
But Gibson - who also promotes TV joint ventures offshore - sees signs of progress in film. Both China and New Zealand can access the other's taxpayer incentives and, between the two of them, that can cover a significant part of the budget for notoriously costly film and TV projects.
New Zealand last year introduced incentives for TV which allow a co-production, or other foreign investment, to get rebates of up to 40 per cent of its spending in this country.
So far those incentives have not led to a flood of Chinese film productions in the Waitakeres, though that is the hope of the Auckland Council's events and development arm, Ateed.
Gibson says the focus in talking to Chinese TV interests so far is on the commission selecting New Zealand producers to work on ventures with the Chinese. But he can see the day when production for Chinese projects has an impact on the New Zealand scene.
For New Zealand, the big appeal of the deal is the scale of the Chinese film and TV sector and the enormous amount of capital available.
Trailblazer
One of the pioneers of TV links with China is Michael Steadman, the former head of Natural History New Zealand, which became the most successful company to broker ties with the Chinese TV sector.
Steadman - who is now retired - said that 15 years ago he was travelling to China five times a year. The lesson for New Zealand film and TV production was to treat it as a long-term process. New Zealanders had been good at building a rapport with Chinese broadcasters and state agencies, he said.
Steadman said he had been impressed by the commission's work under Gibson.
"I was genuinely interested in Chinese history and the way things were done," Steadman said.
"You cannot overestimate how much that was appreciated, that you were interested, and that you were not going there to tell them how to do it our way, as some countries have done."
