France’s Canal+ Group has taken a minority stake in Scandinavian streamer Viaplay who earlier today (July 20) announced a company overhaul that includes cutting a quarter of its workforce.
Canal+ sent a terse statement late on Thursday announcing that it had acquired a 12% stake in the leading pay-TV player in the Nordic countries.
The news comes fresh off of Viaplay’s announcement that it will lay off 25% of its staff representing around 450 jobs and will focus on its core local business, plus sports and international distribution.
Viaplay president and CEO Jorgen Madsen Lindemann said the strategy swing also includes exiting other international markets like the US and UK and reassessing their entire business model, which could include a sale of the entire group. He called the layoffs decision “regrettable” and made “for the sake of the future of our business”.
The Canal+ move is the latest in the ever-evolving consolidation landscape in Europe, powered in particular by French media groups like Mediawan, Banijay and the recently launched private equity-backed Vuelta group, merging France’s Playtime with Germany’s SquareOne and Nordic Scanbox.
Canal+ did not divulge financial details for the deal. The Vivendi subsidiary boasts more than 25.5m subscribers and is present in more than 50 countries with 130 linear and non-linear channels produced in-house.
It is a majority shareholder in leading African pay-TV platform MultiChoice and also aggregates major thematic channels and global content platforms such as Netflix, Disney+, Paramount+ and Apple TV+.
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