Orange ‘exclusivities’ criticised again

[khurramdar]

Orange ‘exclusivities’ criticised again
Written by Pascale Paoli Lebailly
Tuesday, 12 January 2010 18:18

Orange France's exclusive distribution of Orange Sports and Orange Cinéma Séries TV channels among its triple-play subscribers has once again been criticized by a French government report.

A commission (the Hagelsteen report) set up by France's Prime Minister François Fillon confirms that Orange's marketing strategy is prejudicial to the sector and must not be maintained.

Last May, the French telco won in the appeal court a judicial victory that granted it the right to distribute its pay-TV channel Orange Sport to its ADSL subs exclusively. Last July the French competition Authority advised that such exclusivity should be limited to one to two years.

The Prime Minister's commission doesn't specifically follow this suggestion but would prefer any exclusivity be placed under the control of a TV/content authority. The government will decide in the coming weeks about the way the Hagelsteen report should be followed.

Last September 2009, Orange claimed 8,763m IPTV subs and 596 000 subscribers to its channels Orange Sport and Orange Cinéma Séries.

© Rapid TV News 2010