Orange has presented its ‘Essential2020’ five-year plan, which includes some clues on the future of its TV services.
CEO Stéphane Richard said that in France, a new Livebox will be rolled out in 2016. Unlike its competitors Free and Bouygues Telecom, the new generation STBs will not run on Android, but on its own proprietary software.
However, like its competitors, it will be able to bring 4K (UltraHD) content to the viewer’s home. Even, as Richard pointed out, as 4K content is not yet widely available.
In Romania, Orange is now testing its TV-stick (dubbed Chromecast by Orange), but Richard said it will become available in France during the next few months.
In Spain, the group will continue to grow its fibre network and TV offering with a target of doubling convergent revenue by 2018. Its acquisition of Jazztel will enable Orange to accelerate its strategy of having 10 million connectable homes by the end of 2016.
The operator will launch a cable TV service in Belgium later this year via its subsidiary Mobistar.
Orange in talks with Hong Kong-based PCCW to sell a 49% share of its video site, Dailymotion. Richard has been looking at a strategic partner for some time, but has met with political resistance to sell part of the business to a foreign company. Almost two years ago, a possible deal with Yahoo collapsed because the French government blocked it