Orange Wins French Football’s Saturday, VOD, Mobile Rights

Orange has won the right to broadcast some of France’s Ligue 1 football matches between 2008 and 2012. While Vivendi’s (EPA: VIV) Canal+ TV won two of three bundles, giving it rights for Sunday-night matches and PPV, Orange gets the 38 Saturday matches, VOD and mobile rights. The LFP football association gets 668 million euros total from the pair – up from the 653 million euros the current rights batch cost and for which Canal+ had paid 600 million euros. A source tells Thomson Vivendi only stumped up 430 million euros a year this time around. In France, Orange offers a sophisticated and very much integrated triple-play offering that lets customers watch VOD over IPTV, mobile and the desktop web using a multiplatform Rewind TV feature.