While the price of subscriptions such as Netflix (+€1.5 on average), Disney+ (+€2 during 2023) or Canal+ (+€2 on average) do not stop climbing, the Spliiit site offers a system of co -subscription that allows its users to pool their bills and reduce costs.
Like other sites such as Diivii, Sharesub or Sharit, Spliiit gives the possibility (against a commission of 5% + 35 cents) to account owners to authorize complete strangers, and for a fee, to have access to the vacant places of their Netflix or Canal+ subscriptions, like what happens for carpooling.
Beyond SVOD services, Spliiit also allows you to share your Spotify account, NordVPN, The Team or even Dropbox. In total, there are more than 180 services offered, from software to music, through well-being or education applications. But behind its 660,000 registered users and its rather positive results, the platform finds itself at a crossroads, faced with American groups reluctant to let French people play with the gray areas of their CGU.
Guillaume Lochard, co-founder of Spliiit, answered our questions and clarified the horizons for a year 2023 which promises to be decisive. Interview.
I’m not going to comment on that case in particular, because there is another procedure in progress. (…) I think there was initially a lot of confusion on their part about the fact that we were reselling subscriptions. We do not resell subscriptions. (…) We are a trusted third party that facilitates recurring payment between individuals. So we explained each other, and that’s why the first judgment was rendered in this regard.
We are not against publishers, most of us work with them. And if there is an additional cost, we will be able to integrate it somewhere in the rates. We will adapt according to what will be put in place. The unilateral movement that we see is that, more and more, restrictions are being lifted. Lots of services in the United States are doing away with home and family restrictions altogether, because they’ve realized that you don’t have to fight a massive practice like co-subscription. (…) What we are proposing is a solution to monetize this sharing rather than fighting against it. The risk is that if the increase is too high, some people will unsubscribe altogether.
The notion of family used in most publishers’ T&Cs is not applicable as such, because it is not the family in the administrative sense of the term. Afterwards, on the notion of home, there is still a particular case, and it is perhaps there that there is a legal vacuum in Europe which protects us.
We are always open and vigilant. We are ready to discuss with any editor, ready to transform their vision of our activity if it is negative. We have put in place a whole bunch of restrictions precisely to show our credentials to publishers. One adapts to respect their services and that they earn money on the system.
The Spliiit Pro platform has not yet been created because the volume of offers is not large enough to date. But it’s a service that, in a way, already exists thanks to the Software or Security categories. There are also professional and freelance solutions. Eventually, we want to have this separate pro platform, but we are expanding our offer. The freelance market is exploding, and there is every reason to offer this type of multi-user subscription.
This year, the most important thing will be to launch an app, because we are currently only a web platform. We are also going to develop banking services, with the French bank OnlyOne. As a result, you pay for your card and your account every month as usual, and, by doing that, you are authorized to invite someone who can also create their own account and have their card. Independently, of course, we are not going to share bank accounts! We hope that this Banking category will expand during the year. Our goal, in 2023, is to consolidate the market in France and Europe. And to go to even more European countries. There is demand almost everywhere: we are thinking of Poland, Switzerland, Sweden… and Great Britain too, where there are a lot of French people. (…) We want to become essential and facilitate people’s purchasing power.