Video Interview: TV5MONDE’s Marie-Christine Saragosse

NEW YORK: Marie-Christine Saragosse, TV5MONDE’s managing director, discusses the network’s mission, scheduling strategy and expansion plans in this video interview.

When asked which are the most widely distributed global channels in the world, most people will say CNN or MTV, but they probably won’t mention TV5MONDE, the French-language general-entertainment channel that broadcasts 24 hours a day and is available in 200 countries and territories with a cumulative audience of 55 million individual viewers each week.

In fact, TV5MONDE launched more than 25 years ago. It premiered in 1984 with five French-language broadcasters—France’s TF1, Antenne 2 and FR 3, Belgium’s RTBF and Switzerland’s SSR—providing programming and rapidly grew its footprint and number of broadcast partners. Today, 207 million households are connected to TV5MONDE and the service has ten partners (France 2, France 3, France 4, France 5, France Ô, ARTE France, RTBF, TSR, Radio Canada, Télé-Québec) contributing programming. TV5MONDE boasts a schedule that includes contemporary and classic French films, news, children’s, magazine and lifestyle programming, as Saragosse explains in this video interview.

In the U.S., TV5MONDE has some 330,000 subscribing households, and management wants to increase that number. To better serve its subscribers, and to allow them the ability to watch whatever show they want whenever they want, TV5MONDE has begun rolling out on-demand services. It started in New Orleans in March of this year, because of the strong historical and cultural ties the city has with France, and because 20 percent of the households in that market are French speaking. Saragosse plans to introduce on-demand offerings in other cities in the U.S. and around the world.

She also wants to expand the distribution of the linear channel in the U.S., which is currently carried by cable operators, DISH Network as well as on Verizon FiOS and AT&T U-Verse.

It is interesting to note that 57 percent of TV5MONDE’s viewers in the U.S are American and French is not their mother tongue. Consequently, while the channel’s programming is aired in French, some is subtitled in English. Saragosse explains that U.S. subscribers spend around 60 percent of their total TV viewing time watching TV5MONDE and the channel’s churn rate is less than 1 percent.

The channel also offers teachers the Teach and Learn program for learning French and an app was recently introduced for the iPhone.

In the U.S., TV5MONDE has plans for a new program, which would air twice a month, and would focus on cultural events in the U.S. that are linked with French culture or French-speaking countries’ culture.

Saragosse and her team want to continue to expand TV5MONDE’s reach around the world. Last year, despite the economic downturn, the channel increased its subscriber base by more than 10 percent.