By Stuart Thomson

Salto, the French subscription video-on-demand service launched last year as a JV between the country’s main terrestrial broadcasters to combat the growing power of Netflix, has so far attracted 200,000 subscribers according to financial daily Les Echos.

The paper did not reveal its sources for the number, which has not been officially released by the streaming service, jointly owned by pubcaster France Télélvisions and commercial broadcasters TF1 and M6.

Salto, which launched three months ago, had around 100,000 subscribers at the end of November, three weeks after its launch date, and just ahead of terminations of an initial tranche of free trial periods, according to another paper, Le Figaro.

According to Les Echos, the 200,000 number also includes free trial customers. The service had an estimated 60,000 paying customers in early December. The overall figure also includes some 14,000 employees of the three JV partners, all of whom benefit from a six months free subscription period.

Salto has not revealed its overall subscriber goals, and has not published official figures, but observers see the 200,000 as very much on the light side. Netflix, which launched in France in 2014, counted 200,000 customers after two weeks, rising to 750,000 after a year. https://www.digitaltveurope.com