Canal Plus signs 100K subs in 6 weeks! Is it Christmas yet?????????
French Media Notes...
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The number of homes in France connected to cable reached 2,278,737 million out of 6,789,429 homes passed last month. The number subscribing to at least the basic service (15 channels) was 1,575,245. After the traditional summer break, the number of subscribers increased by 18,000 in September.
Penetration was 23.2 per cent, compared with 21.94 per cent a year earlier. The association of French cable operators (AFCO) attributes the increase to a number of factors: the improvement in the range of programmes offered, the impact of the autumn advertising campaign, increasing digitalisation, the growing number of sites offering Internet access and the deployment of attractive tariffs with a number of sites offering basic access for less than Ffr100 per month.
By comparison, the digital DTH bouquets are growing somewhat faster. TPS recorded its record week with 16,000 new subscriptions. Canal Plus has just reached 600,000 digital subscribers, with 100,000 new subscribers in the last six weeks. This includes both subscribers to the Canal Plus digital service and to the Canal Satelliye Numerique bouquet. About 9 per cent take Canal Plus only, and 27 per cent take Canal Satelite only. The remainder take both.
In other French news, TPS is to exclusively broadcast a dedicated 16:9 football channel during the 1998 World Cup, Superfoot 98. It will be operated in co-operation with private channel TF1 and state channels FR2 and FR3, all three of which are partners in TPS and the Japanese broadcaster NHK. The number of 16:9 TV sets in France is expected to be about 1 million at the time of the World Cup. |
