Following its content distribution deal with Prime Video, France Télévisions is now seeking to strengthen its partnership with YouTube, the president of the French PSB Group, Delphine Ernotte Cunci, has revealed.While the group is claiming its digital platform, france.tv, which now also aggregates content from other French PSB players including TV5 Monde, Arte and INA, has become “the leading streaming platform in France” with “record-breaking” audience figures (42.9 million unique visitors in June), it wants to have its content more widely distributed.Consequently, France Télévisions is in talks with YouTube to offer new content on the video sharing platform, whilst preserving the “integrity and quality” of its offerings.“My goal isn’t to distribute all content everywhere, but to know where to reach each viewer, wherever they are, thanks to an offering adapted to viewers’ usage and expectations,” Cunci explained at a media briefing.The PSB group has also announced its digital sport channel will be reactivated in 2026, and maintained afterwards. The channel debuted for the Paris 2024 Games, and will be relaunched in February 2026 for the Winter Olympics, and kept on air through to the next winter games in France in 2030.France Télévisions has secured the rights to the Olympic Games until 2032, through an agreement with EBU and Warner Bros Discovery.Presenting the 2025-2026 programming lineup, France Télévisions said its new season of content is heavily dictated by budgetary restraint. Having decided to maintain its investments in French original content (€440 million per year), other segments such as entertainment and foreign game show formats have seen their budget decrease. This is the case for daily quiz show Questions pour une champion (Going For Gold from Fremantle) which will soon be broadcast on weekends only.“All producers of entertainment content have accepted a 5 per cent reduction in their spendings. This has a strong effect on the schedules, but such a decrease represents a €15 million reduction in investement from September to December 2025, compared to the €350 million invested into entertainment each year,” said France Télévisions managing director Stéphane Sitbon-Gomez.From 2012 to 2025, France Télévisions’ financial means haven’t been increased bythe French State, remaining at €2.5 billion per year.In that period, the PSB “absorbed a 25 per cent inflation rate” explained Cunci, adding that she currently has no information regarding the 2026 budget.While the French government PSB audiovisual reform is playing out erratically, Sitbon-Gomezt, who campaigns in favour of a ‘French BBC’, said the various financial cuts at the end of 2024 and on February 2025 amounted to a total of €115 million within three months.The group is planning a €50 million deficit in 2025 and warns it will struggle to break even. “Our financial situation isn’t good,” admitted Cunci.
© 2001-2025. Advanced Television.