TF1 has Molotov very heavily condemned for counterfeiting

New legal setback for Molotov. According to information from Capital, the Paris court on Friday ordered the start-up to pay 8.5 million euros to TF1 for “forgery”. Little consolation: it’s half less than what the front page claimed … The internet television application has been criticized for broadcasting the TF1 group’s channels since mid-2019 without authorization or contract. The judges therefore order him to stop this broadcasting within 15 days, under penalty of a 75,000 euros fine per day of delay.

The dispute concerned the price to be paid to broadcast the TF1 group channels. In 2015, Molotov had entered into a contract providing for a tariff of 1.5 million euros per year, but this contract was experimental and expired in mid-2019. TF1 then offered the platform its new price list, with a sliding scale based on the number of subscribers and a minimum of 4 million euros per year (this floor price was used by the court to calculate the damages to be paid by Molotov).

Molotov refused this price list, arguing that it favored the ‘big’ to the detriment of the ‘small’: “this grid leads to imposing a very high price up to 500,000 subscribers and to favor internet service providers, such as Orange which, with its 27 million subscribers, benefits from a tariff of 0.0793 euros (Editor’s note: per subscriber) ”, pleaded the platform. But the court returned it in its goals: “this degressive pricing constitutes a current practice, and is applicable to all the distributors”.

The platform also complained that TF1’s price list was based on all registered users, whether or not they were active. However, with 11.5 million registered users at Molotov, this resulted in a very high price, “15 times the price paid before”, or about 22 million euros per year, a “prohibitive” sum. Molotov argued that its number of registered users “does not reflect the actual use of its platform”, and asked that only active users, who are much less numerous, be taken into account. The application admitted, during its recent takeover by the American FuboTV, to have only 4 million active users, even if its press releases continue to claim “more than 17 million users” …

But, here again, this argument was swept aside by the judges: “Molotov cannot usefully argue that the calculation method provided for in TF1’s offer is discriminatory on the sole ground that it is not favorable to him. Molotov users have the option of remaining registered without having to justify their activity, or to register under various identifiers. Such a situation results only from the model of registration and management of accounts that Molotov has chosen and clearly does not plan to change, in particular by proceeding to a regular deactivation of dormant accounts ”.

The start-up also pleaded – but in vain – that it was obliged to broadcast TF1 by law, precisely by the device known as “must carry”. She also argued – without more success – that TF1 was behaving in “bad faith”, in a manifestly unfair and faulty manner ”, and was committing an“ abuse of rights ”….

⋙ Read also – M6 suspected of not respecting the commitments made to launch Salto

This is the second procedure that the platform loses against TF1. In 2019, she had already attacked her before the Competition Authority, accusing it of not respecting the obligations imposed by the anti-trust when Salto was created. She had placed a lot of hope in these obligations: “the Competition Authority has established rules which should smooth out our difficulties with TF1”, predicted its president Jean-David Blanc. But it was not: the gendarme of the competition dismissed Molotov, a decision then confirmed on appeal.

A final trial is still ongoing between TF1 and Molotov, this time before the Paris Commercial Court. The start-up, at the origin of the procedure, again disputes the price claimed by TF1 for its channels, and asks for less than 100 million euros in compensation for its damage.

However, while they clashed in court, Molotov continued to discuss with TF1 to broadcast its channels. It is therefore very possible that an amicable agreement will soon be found, allowing the channels to continue broadcasting. This is what just happened with M6, with whom an agreement was announced on December 17th. After four years of conflict, Molotov finally accepted all the conditions imposed by the Six concerning the price to be paid for the channels, and also their distribution only within the paid offers of the application (“paywall” clause).

This amicable agreement came after a series of successive legal defeats against M6, in particular the conviction (revealed by the Parisian) from Molotov to pay to M6 to pay 7 million euros for “counterfeiting” and “parasitism”. Likewise, Molotov has been broadcasting M6 channels since April 1, 2018, without authorization, and without paying for them either.

Contacted, TF1 declined to comment and Molotov did not respond.

⋙ Read also – FuboTV, the buyer of Molotov, has yet to demonstrate its viability

Molotov’s results