After our article yesterday on the fact that the Ouest France Group channel could not be on the air on March 1, 2024, while C8 and NRJ12 must stop on February 28 by decision of the ARCOM, François- Xavier Lefranc, chairman of the management board of Ouest-France, wanted to answer us:
“There is no “twist”; the launch date of the OFTV channel, September 1, has always been announced; it appears in the file presented to Arcom and was recalled at the hearing in front of the college. A hearing that can easily be listened to again on the Arcom website.
Furthermore, our investments and forecast resources remain consistent with the file presented to Arcom. We are planning a gradual increase in staff numbers and creation of the studio, permitted by the Arcom Council for new entrants.”
A statement, which ultimately confirms what we indicated. The channel will therefore not be ready for March 1, 2025, but for September 1, 2025. As for hiring, it will be limited initially. Finally regarding the construction of the studio which “should not take place before 2 or 3 years”, no denial on this point.
This therefore confirms that ARCOM will remove C8, the first DTT channel in France, on February 28, to replace it with a channel which is not yet ready.
In this, let us clarify that Ouest-France has nothing to do with this aberration and was content to respond to a call for tenders and successfully. We can simply wonder about the timing put in place by ARCOM and the reasons for these choices, while the Ouest France channel could, for example, have find it on channel 19 which is today… free!
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Reminder of our article from yesterday:
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It’s a real twist of theater that is taking place behind the scenes and which could perhaps change the situation! According to La Lettre, Ouest-France is (already) in the process of scaling back its plans for the creation of its TV channel. While the group should take the place of C8 or NRJ12 on March 1 with a new TV channel, it seems that the ambitions have been significantly reduced and are far from the promises that were made before the ARCOM to obtain a frequency.
On the one hand, according to La Lettre, the channel will not be ready on March 1 while C8 should stop on February 28, but the number of jobs displayed during the hearing is almost halved, and the plateau in the region, which was the center of the chain’s argument, will not be built for 2 or 3 years!.
It is therefore no longer 58 employees who will be hired, but only…35!
As for the launch of the channel, it should not be before September 1st if ARCOM accepts it. Clearly, the regulatory authority decides to eliminate the first TNT channel in France, C8, and its nearly 200 jobs directly or indirectly linked, for a channel which will not be ready on March 1 with only 35 employees. .
Enough to wonder about the choices and the programs that will be offered to viewers who undoubtedly wanted to continue watching their favorite channel.
Why these changes? To minimize investments until “a certain level of audience has not been reached” the group’s leaders are said to have said
But that’s not all, because the construction work on the TV set in Rennes, which was one of the channel’s main arguments to defend its regional roots, will not begin before 2 or 3 years, that is to say in 2026 , or even 2027, due to their significant cost.”
On July 16, 2024, five leaders of the Ouest-France group had in fact defended against Arcom a file comprising “five pillars”: a daily talk show entitled “Le Talk en true” focusing on humans “with people we don’t see on television”, entertainment, with the adaptation of digital formats but also recordings of concerts and comedy shows, information, with a daily news (“De la common in the world”), fiction, with two cinema evenings per week and accompanied in certain cases by debate evenings. There could also be broadcasts of cycling competitions.
