Acquisition of BFM TV by Rodolphe Sade: End of news/people format to return to DNA, departure of Marc-Olivier Fogel, names of new managers… Here’s everything that’s rumored for the future!

Patrick Drahi’s Altice Group has announced the acquisition by CMA CGM of its media subsidiary, Altice Media, which notably includes the BFM and RMC bouquets. Franco-Lebanese shipowner Rodolphe Sade is thus consolidating the press group he is in the process of setting up. CMA CGM (Compagnie Maritime d’Affretment – Compagnie General Maritime) is a southern French media group based in La Provence (Provence, Corsica-Matin) for 81 million eurosAgainst Xavier Neill, founder of Free and another billionaire media mogul.

The shipping company then bought the business newspaper Gallery and now completes its catalog with BFM-TV and RMC. WhyNot Media, CMA CGM’s media subsidiary, also owns a 10% market share of M6 and Brut, and “has ambitions to create a leading media group”, according to its managing director Laurent Guimier, who was briefed on the matter.

Losing momentum for months and now overtaken by CNews as France’s leading news channel from Monday to Friday, BFM has to rediscover its DNA. Today, lost in successive formats in search of a lost audience, the news channel now seems to oscillate between news items, justice and people, having lost the “hard news” reflex that was its soul. The difference between BFM and CNews in the 2020/2021 season was 1.1 points. That’s… 0.1 points in the last month, February 2024!

According to media historian Alexis Lavrier at France Information:

“Since the end of the Drahi era, BFM has been in a bit of an identity crisis, meaning that BFM’s success has long been based on hard news, and then, recently, they have tried to move into these areas. CNews, but not with the same success. So we should expect that BFM will refocus on its original identity because it works well, but it will not be in the logic of power contestation, no doubt,” says the historian. .

Another question, the replacement of Marc-Oliver Fogel as General Director. Since his arrival at the head of the channel in 2019, it has steadily declined, losing its leading position, its headliners and its image. We won’t go back to the series of subsequent departures here, nor to the damaging atmosphere that existed among the editorial staff for months, but one thing is certain: this departure will be one of the keys to the channel’s relaunch.

Many names have been floated for his replacement with already well-known personalitiesTV savvy, close to Rodolphe Sade, and not really leaning towards the popularization that BFM would end up with.

Among these names, we have, of course, Laurent Guimier, the former news boss of France Télé, Bruno Judy who is today appointed as deputy director of La Tribune Dimanche and political columnist on BFM TV or even Jean-Christophe Tortora as executive general director. of Whynot Media, which brings together the CMA-CGM group’s press titles…

As long as, using his very active lobbying and his claimed closeness to Brigitte Macron, Marc-Olivier Fogiel manages once again to save his place, despite the consequences…