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RD
Roger Darthwell
London Lite posted:
I would have thought selling to Altice would be the easiest to get past the French regulator as it'd maintain the same amount of competitors as now while allowing Altice to become a major player in French broadcasting.

If TF1 or Canal go for it, there would almost certainly be a competition review with the possibility of selling channels or other parts of their businesses to get M6 through. It could also see cuts to M6's news department as TF1 and Canal already have news divisions which could produce the M6 bulletins using existing teams, although they may want to keep the existing presenters to keep continuity.

It may also be the case that other radio groups may want the radio business. RTL being the revenue earner out of those three stations. RTL2 and Fun Radio not so much.

I think M6 has gone as far as it can under the lead of RTL being the major shareholder in the business but needs new blood to take the group further.

Very good point, but what happens for example if Italy's Mediaset ends up buying M6 Group, they were mentioned as possible buyers
LL
London Lite Founding member
Roger Darthwell posted:
London Lite posted:
I would have thought selling to Altice would be the easiest to get past the French regulator as it'd maintain the same amount of competitors as now while allowing Altice to become a major player in French broadcasting.

If TF1 or Canal go for it, there would almost certainly be a competition review with the possibility of selling channels or other parts of their businesses to get M6 through. It could also see cuts to M6's news department as TF1 and Canal already have news divisions which could produce the M6 bulletins using existing teams, although they may want to keep the existing presenters to keep continuity.

It may also be the case that other radio groups may want the radio business. RTL being the revenue earner out of those three stations. RTL2 and Fun Radio not so much.

I think M6 has gone as far as it can under the lead of RTL being the major shareholder in the business but needs new blood to take the group further.

Very good point, but what happens for example if Italy's Mediaset ends up buying M6 Group, they were mentioned as possible buyers


That depends if they want a foreign owner of a French tv company, but I don't think there are any major competition issues otherwise. RTL is Luxembourgish but on their front door in comparison to Mediaset.

Personally I'd like M6 to stay in Francophone hands with a company that understands the French market as Canal and TF1 still have French parent groups.
KU
Kunst
Most of Luxembourg is trilingual anyway:, Luxembourgish, German, French.

It's not even that foreign, and given its geographical and cultural proximities to France, Germany and Benelux, it acts as a "magnet", especially as there were historically less restrictions for opening up a commercial station
Roger Darthwell and London Lite gave kudos
LL
London Lite Founding member
The launch of Culturebox went out on France 2, presumably as the availability of the channel is reduced to TNT, Fransat and online.
Last edited by London Lite on 1 February 2021 11:31pm
WI
william Founding member
Week 1 PDF schedule now available.
LL
London Lite Founding member
As I suspected, Culturebox is on Fransat at 11096 V at Eutelsat 5W.

Incidentally the Swiss OTT providers of Franceinfo and France 4 have dropped the resolution to SD, which I'd assume is from an overlap DTT signal that gets in Geneva as the satellite signals are encrypted, which wouldn't meet the Swiss rules on rebroadcasting FTA signals.
RD
Roger Darthwell
London Lite posted:
Roger Darthwell posted:
London Lite posted:
I would have thought selling to Altice would be the easiest to get past the French regulator as it'd maintain the same amount of competitors as now while allowing Altice to become a major player in French broadcasting.

If TF1 or Canal go for it, there would almost certainly be a competition review with the possibility of selling channels or other parts of their businesses to get M6 through. It could also see cuts to M6's news department as TF1 and Canal already have news divisions which could produce the M6 bulletins using existing teams, although they may want to keep the existing presenters to keep continuity.

It may also be the case that other radio groups may want the radio business. RTL being the revenue earner out of those three stations. RTL2 and Fun Radio not so much.

I think M6 has gone as far as it can under the lead of RTL being the major shareholder in the business but needs new blood to take the group further.

Very good point, but what happens for example if Italy's Mediaset ends up buying M6 Group, they were mentioned as possible buyers


That depends if they want a foreign owner of a French tv company, but I don't think there are any major competition issues otherwise. RTL is Luxembourgish but on their front door in comparison to Mediaset.

Personally I'd like M6 to stay in Francophone hands with a company that understands the French market as Canal and TF1 still have French parent groups.

Good idea, thank you Sir! I wonder if Altice does buy M6, then they are simply going to merge it with NextRadioTV, and if so then the news on M6 can easily be supplied by BFM TV
MR
mrwish
London Lite posted:
As I suspected, Culturebox is on Fransat at 11096 V at Eutelsat 5W.

Incidentally the Swiss OTT providers of Franceinfo and France 4 have dropped the resolution to SD, which I'd assume is from an overlap DTT signal that gets in Geneva as the satellite signals are encrypted, which wouldn't meet the Swiss rules on rebroadcasting FTA signals.


Yes, the 11096 signal was where I got the pre-launch screenshot from (with the FTV Malakoff caption).

On Fransat, France 4 and France Info have stayed HD. On the multistream (that feeds the terrestrial transmitters), they’ve of course been dropped to 720x576. I’m slightly surprised Fransat seem to therefore have their own dedicated feed of France Télévisions rather than using the same version as ends up at the terrestrial transmitters (pretty much all the channels on Fransat match the bitrate/stat-mux configuration of their TNT version). I’d just assumed they receive a copy of the multiplex transport stream from the TNT broadcasters that they then added their own EPG/encryption to. Maybe they do for the other channels.
London Lite and Roger Darthwell gave kudos
LL
London Lite Founding member
mrwish posted:
London Lite posted:
As I suspected, Culturebox is on Fransat at 11096 V at Eutelsat 5W.

Incidentally the Swiss OTT providers of Franceinfo and France 4 have dropped the resolution to SD, which I'd assume is from an overlap DTT signal that gets in Geneva as the satellite signals are encrypted, which wouldn't meet the Swiss rules on rebroadcasting FTA signals.


Yes, the 11096 signal was where I got the pre-launch screenshot from (with the FTV Malakoff caption).

On Fransat, France 4 and France Info have stayed HD. On the multistream (that feeds the terrestrial transmitters), they’ve of course been dropped to 720x576. I’m slightly surprised Fransat seem to therefore have their own dedicated feed of France Télévisions rather than using the same version as ends up at the terrestrial transmitters (pretty much all the channels on Fransat match the bitrate/stat-mux configuration of their TNT version). I’d just assumed they receive a copy of the multiplex transport stream from the TNT broadcasters that they then added their own EPG/encryption to. Maybe they do for the other channels.


I seem to recall that Fransat had Franceinfo at 720x576 before France Ô was removed and was upgraded to HD at the same time as the terrestrial transmitters were upgraded to allow F4 to be at 1920x1080 from 1440x1080, so this is a new development for them to keep 4/info at FHD instead of dropping them to SD. I think Canal/TNTSat had Franceinfo in HD at 19E regardless?
mrwish and Roger Darthwell gave kudos
WW
WW Update
Roger Darthwell posted:
That depends if they want a foreign owner of a French tv company, but I don't think there are any major competition issues otherwise.


Considering that France and Italy are both EU members, could the regulator block the sale for that reason even if it wanted to? In other words, wouldn't such a move constitute a clear case of intra-single market discrimination?
LL
London Lite Founding member
WW Update posted:
Roger Darthwell posted:
That depends if they want a foreign owner of a French tv company, but I don't think there are any major competition issues otherwise.


Considering that France and Italy are both EU members, could the regulator block the sale for that reason even if it wanted to? In other words, wouldn't such a move constitute a clear case of intra-single market discrimination?


Considering the majority shareholder of M6 is currently from Luxembourg, that clearly isn't an issue.
MR
mrwish
London Lite posted:
mrwish posted:
London Lite posted:
As I suspected, Culturebox is on Fransat at 11096 V at Eutelsat 5W.

Incidentally the Swiss OTT providers of Franceinfo and France 4 have dropped the resolution to SD, which I'd assume is from an overlap DTT signal that gets in Geneva as the satellite signals are encrypted, which wouldn't meet the Swiss rules on rebroadcasting FTA signals.


Yes, the 11096 signal was where I got the pre-launch screenshot from (with the FTV Malakoff caption).

On Fransat, France 4 and France Info have stayed HD. On the multistream (that feeds the terrestrial transmitters), they’ve of course been dropped to 720x576. I’m slightly surprised Fransat seem to therefore have their own dedicated feed of France Télévisions rather than using the same version as ends up at the terrestrial transmitters (pretty much all the channels on Fransat match the bitrate/stat-mux configuration of their TNT version). I’d just assumed they receive a copy of the multiplex transport stream from the TNT broadcasters that they then added their own EPG/encryption to. Maybe they do for the other channels.


I seem to recall that Fransat had Franceinfo at 720x576 before France Ô was removed and was upgraded to HD at the same time as the terrestrial transmitters were upgraded to allow F4 to be at 1920x1080 from 1440x1080, so this is a new development for them to keep 4/info at FHD instead of dropping them to SD. I think Canal/TNTSat had Franceinfo in HD at 19E regardless?


As you say, Fransat changed the configuration for France 4 and France Info to go full HD at the same time as happened terrestrially, so that’s what was making me think it was probably via the same feed. It’s obviously separate though, even though encoded (until now anyway!) to the same specs.

I don’t have an active TNTSAT card any more to check, but Franceinfo was always 1440x1080 HD on there when I had one until about six months ago. The most bizarre on there was France Ô before it closed. Canal were transmitting it as 1440x1080, but it was a pretty grotty SD upscale, even though there was an HD version of the channel being played out and shown by at least a couple of the IPTV providers in France. The same still happens on Canal/TNTSAT with LCI - it’s transmitted as 1440x1080 but it’s an upscale of an SD feed. On Fransat and other providers it’s native HD.
London Lite and Roger Darthwell gave kudos

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