Updated: The stake is 10 percent, for $2 million. The deal includes an option to acquire a controlling stake in the company at the end of 2008.

SEE ALSO: ‘Afterworld’ Brings Big Budget Series To Life On MySpace

The Santa Monica-based hot digital production studio Electric Farm Entertainment, the subject of a long fawning profile in latest Wired, has received investment from Granada America, the U.S. TV production arm of UK’s ITV (LSE: ITV). The terms of the deal were not disclosed. EFE is the digital studio behind the upcoming Rosario Dawson sci-fi short series Gemini Division, and online comedy Woke Up Dead, starring Jon Heder, both for NBCU’s digital studio. The company has also done shows for MySpace (Afterworld). It was founded by Jeff Sagansky, a former co-president of Sony (NYSE: SNE) Pictures Entertainment and head of CBS (NYSE: CBS) Entertainment before that; Stan Rogow, the producer who made Lizzie McGuire for Disney (NYSE: DIS) and turned Hilary Duff into a star; and TV writer Brent Friedman.

With this stake in EFE, Granada America looks to be more actively involved in creating new-media projects and also migrate more online content to TV, says this story. Its shows in U.S. include Hell’s Kitchen, Nanny 911 and Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares for Fox, Celebrity Fit Club for VH1, Hit Me Baby One More Time for NBC, and others.

As for “Gemini Division”, the central plot in that Wired story, the deal with NBCU would put EFE “well on its way to recouping the $1.75 million or so it will cost to make the 50 three-minute episodes Rogow plans to shoot,” the story said.