One of the biggest announcements out of this year’s Cannes Lions week, certainly from a TV advertising point of view, was the landmark deal between French broadcaster TF1 and international streaming giant Netflix. The partnership will see TF1’s content and linear channels made available directly via Netflix’s interface in France next year. The partnership — the first of its kind for both parties — presented an interesting new distribution model for TF1, raising questions about whether we’d see more similar deals struck in the future.
That question was answered very promptly. Just over two weeks later, TF1’s compatriot France Télévisions unveiled its own partnership with Amazon Prime Video, similarly making its on-demand content and linear channels available through the subscription service.
There are some significant differences between the deals. The France.TV partnership has gone live immediately, meaning there are fewer unknowns. We know, for example, that France.TV’s entire on-demand catalogue has been made available through Prime Video, whereas it’s not certain whether the TF1 deal will be as comprehensive. And Prime Video, unlike Netflix, already distributed linear channels, including some owned by other broadcasters, prior to the France.TV integration.
Regardless, the fact that both deals have emerged in the same country in such a short space of time is striking. Are we seeing a new blueprint emerging, of local broadcasters pairing up with the SVOD giants? Or are these partnerships likely to be unique to the French market?
Marriages of convenience
We don’t know the full details or financial terms of either deal. On the advertising front for example, in both cases the French broadcaster will sell inventory on their own content, but it’s not known whether the streamer will take a cut of those revenues (perhaps in exchange for supplying their own targeting data, for example). Regardless, the analysts VideoWeek spoke with said there are some clear benefits to both sides from these arrangements.
From a streamer’s point of view, these sorts of broadcaster partnerships “aid localisation efforts, increasing the volume of high-quality and locally-relevant content available to their subscribers, which is a key tool for ensuring long-term engagement and limiting churn within a given market,” said Peter Ingram, research manager at Ampere Analysis. “These deals also allow streamers to capitalise on the strengths of linear programming (such as communal and appointment viewing) to attract and engage diverse audience segments.”
Ian Whittaker, founder and managing director at Liberty Sky Advisors, said it is notable that both deals have happened in France, where local language content is especially important, and regulators are particularly sensitive to the issue of keeping French content prominent on streaming services.
Meanwhile Tim Westcott, practice lead, digital content and channels at Omdia, said that for Netflix specifically, the deal could be partly geared towards boosting its nascent advertising business. “From the point of view of Netflix, it will of course be looking to gain more viewing share in France, and also increase its share of advertising spend,” he said. “Its ad sales business is relatively new and the TF1 deal may be a recognition that Netflix cannot afford to fight on too many fronts as it tries to develop its advertising business against strong local players like TF1 in France as well as the US tech giants internationally. We think that TF1 will continue to control its ad inventory on its linear channels although ad revenues for TF1’s on-demand content will be shared.”
Indeed for the streamers, these deals more broadly might be a sign that they’re starting to pick their battles in overseas markets. Both companies have deep pockets when it comes to content investment, and already spend heavily on foreign language content. But going toe-to-toe with local broadcasters on the content front in every market might be a step too far. From a business point of view, perhaps it makes sense for the streamers to simply partner with a broadcaster and quickly get access to a large library of established local content, rather than trying to do it all themselves.
Sports is a good example here. Sports rights are hugely expensive, hence Netflix’s limited investment so far. But they’re also very valuable. Westcott said Netflix’s partnership with TF1 could be a win-win on this front: Netflix gets local live sports, while TF1 might be able to spend more on sports rights thanks to the additional audience it can monetise on Netflix.
No ménage à trois
For the broadcasters, these partnerships put their content in front of audiences who they might not otherwise reach.
“From the point of view of TF1, the broadcaster seems to have come to the view that there are Netflix subscribers in France who don’t watch TF1 — in significant enough numbers that making its channels and on-demand content available on Netflix won’t lead to too much cannibalisation,” said Westcott. “Rodolphe Belmer, chief executive of TF1, commented to the AFP that the deal would ‘bring a net benefit in audience reach’ which appears to back this up.” In this sense, it’s the same logic which is leading some broadcasters to release a portion of their content catalogues on YouTube.
But while multiple broadcasters within the same market have been willing to distribute some of their series via YouTube (as is the case with Channel 4 and ITV in the UK), they’re unlikely to want to partner with the same SVOD service.
“Whether TF1 will be exclusive to Netflix in France remains to be seen – the deal does not start until 2026 so it may be further details are being ironed out,” said Westcott. “You would expect TF1 would want it to be exclusive, while Netflix might be open to more deals.”
“A scenario where one global platform becomes the central hub for national broadcast content introduces several risks,” said Ampere’s Peter Ingram. “From a broadcaster’s perspective, should other competitors make similar deals with the same SVOD player, their content could become deprioritised within the platform’s broader catalogue rather than being showcased through a clearly branded partnership that maintains its unique brand identity. There would also be the concern here that platforms may consolidate too much influence should they become the central hub for local content in a market, cannibalising rather than complementing broadcasters’ traditional operations.”
There’s logic to the idea of local broadcasters grouping together and distributing their content via one streaming hub. Indeed, TF1 and France.TV, alongside M6, already tried to create such a platform with Salto. But the big argument behind a unified platform is that it would help local broadcasters compete more effectively with the big international streamers. So the notion that they might collectively agree to make all their content available via Netflix or Amazon themselves seems unfeasible.
French exceptionalism
Is this, then, a model which we’ll see replicated elsewhere in Europe, where each broadcaster ties the knot with one SVOD service in a monogamous union? Those VideoWeek spoke with suggested that’s not necessarily the case, since these types of deals are unlikely to work broadly across all markets.
“I think we will see different structures in different markets,” said Ian Whittaker. “My feeling is the structure of the deal reflects more the French market itself rather than a template for other countries.”
As mentioned, regulators are particularly sensitive in France, and there might be a political element at play for the SVOD services. “Interestingly, Netflix went with TF1 and Amazon went with France TV – both of whom are politically well connected – but nobody has gone with M6, which has arguably a younger audience but which is owned by RTL.” France is also a market where Amazon and Netflix likely know they are limited in how much more market share they’re likely to take according to Whittaker, which means these deals could be seen as a way of consolidating their share rather than growing it. In other markets where the streamers see more potential for growth, broadcaster partnerships might not be so attractive.
Ampere’s Peter Ingram agreed, suggesting that the strength of France’s broadcasters is a significant factor in enabling these deals. “According to data from Ampere’s Consumer survey, France is one of the few remaining European markets in which the weekly viewing time of scheduled linear TV exceeds that of subscription OTT, and so deals reached with TF1 and France.TV have presented an opportunity for VOD services in France to tap into a highly engaged audience that remains relatively loyal to linear TV, and allow them to drive engagement to their platforms,” he said. “For further advancement of this strategy, markets where subscription OTT has already overtaken scheduled TV viewing time (such as the UK and Spain) may offer less incentive for streamers to pursue these partnerships, as they have already established a strong competitive foothold with local audiences.”
That’s not to say we won’t see these sorts of deals replicated at all. Ingram said that France could act as a testing ground for these types of partnerships, which may be repeated elsewhere if they prove successful. “In markets like Italy and Poland (where audiences still remain fairly loyal to linear TV despite a more mature entertainment ecosystem) these deals may prove valuable for global platforms in enhancing their local engagement,” he said.
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