BFM is accelerating its development in the regions with the launch on July 5 of three new channels in Marseille, Toulon and Nice, thus enabling the Altice group, owner of BFMTV, to cover a large part of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region.
Five months after the acquisition of Azur TV and four months after the launch of BFM Dici in the Hautes-Alpes and the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, the Altice group marks the birth of BFM Marseille Provence, Toulon Var and Nice-Côte d'Azur, three channels which will eventually have around 40 journalists.
"
We worked quickly (...) it is the symbol of the central place that this project occupies today for the Altice Média group in (its) development strategy
", declared Hervé Beroud, deputy director of Altice Media during a press conference.
A "
great newspaper from the south
" throughout the summer
This also reflects Altice Media's desire to launch its three channels and their platforms (websites and applications) at the height of the tourist traffic, particularly oriented towards “service
information
” (road traffic, weather, atmospheric pollution, cultural agenda. , etc).
Hence a launch in two stages: first with a program common to these three channels, "
a major newspaper from the south which will broadcast throughout the summer
" until October, before each channel broadcasts its own schedule. programs, from the end of October, said Philippe Benayoun, director of BFM Régions.
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Since 2016, BFMTV has displayed its ambition in local news by launching BFM Paris, then BFM Lyon in 2019, followed by BFM Grand Lille and BFM Grand littoral in 2020. In total, these bring together more than 2.7 million viewers per week, according to Médiamétrie data from September to December 2020, cited by the audiovisual group. Asked about the future editorial independence of the three new channels, the management of BFM Régions indicated that they did not want to "
work in fact around COM, contracts of objectives and resources, with local and regional authorities
". "
Editorial treatment is completely independent, it is the hallmark of our group, we have no intention of doing otherwise and we would be suicidal to want to do otherwise
», Concluded Hervé Beroud.