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landmarks
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overview
This note considers the Bouygues engineering and telecommunications
conglomerate, which controls the dominant French commercial
television network TF1.
It covers -
 introduction
The Bouygues group operates in 80 countries, employing
some 115,000 people in civil engineering, telecommunications,
broadcasting and utilities management (eg power network
operation in Africa). Sales in 2005 were around €24.1
billion (€7.1 billion outside France). As of December
2005 its market capitalisation was €13.9 billion.
The group was founded by Francis Bouygues (1923-1993)
and expanded from minor construction and property development
to embrace construction, film finance (wound down in 1998
after involvement in works such as Jane Campion's The
Piano) and other interests. By 1999 it was reportedly
Europe's largest construction group but was hobbled by
shareholder disagreements and build-up of stakes by Vincent
Bollore and Francois Pinault.
The company has a 90% stake in Bouygues Telecom (France's
third mobile phone carrier) and around 40% of TF1 (France's
leading commercial television TV channel). Martin and
Olivier, sons of company's founder, together own around
18% of Bouygues. That stake was attributed by the Economist,
in a 2 December 2006 feature article, to a succession
of interesting - and legal, under French corporate law
- share deals.
development
Bouygues' construction arm was responsible for Terminal
2 of Paris Charles de Gaulle airport (Paris), Dar-es-Salaam
airport in Tanzania, Les Halles complex and the Elf Tower
in La Défense business district (Paris), Hassan
II mosque in Casablanca, the European Parliament building
in Strasbourg, Pacific Place towers in Hong Kong, James
Bay dam in Canada, Bibliotheque National (Paris, Ashgabat
Presidential Palace in Turkmenistan, N4 highway in South
Africa and AsiaWorld Expo exhibition centre in Hong Kong.
Acquisition of TF1 was reflected in an acquaintance's
recollection that
Francis held politicians in the greatest contempt since
he knew he could buy them off. As the owner of a TV
network, he understands that he no longer has to go
begging after them since they will be the ones eating
out of his hand
holdings
As of 2005 Bouygues had five divisions -
-
Bouygues Construction (100%) - construction
-
Colas (95%) - construction
- Bouygues
Immobilier (100%) - property development, finance, investment
and management
-
TF1 (42.9%) - French television network with newspaper,
film production and music publishing interests
-
Bouygues Télécom (90%) - French mobile
phone network
TF1
TF1, the dominant French commercial television broadcaster,
traces its origins to the early 1970s when it formed part
of the state radio and television broadcasting organisation
as Télévision Française 1. It was
privatised for US$900 million in 1987, with Bouygues joining
Maxwell, Bernard Tapie, Indosuez,
Crédit Lyonnais and Société Générale
as key shareholders.
Privatisation saw TF1 rely on advertising rather than
a BBC-style subvention from the national government. TF1
expanded into content production, beginning with establishment
in 1988 of Une Musique as a music publisher and record
producer. In 1990 it formed Banco Production (feature
film and telefilm production) and acquired of Protécréa
(audiovisual production). Bouygues raised its stake in
TF1 from 25% to 34% in 1994, later increasing that shareholding.
In 1995 it acquired 60% of Glem Productions, a gameshow
producer, and during the following year established Télévision
Par Satellite (TPS) - a digital broadcaster - in partnership
with France Télévision, CLT,
France Télécom, M6 and Lyonnaise des Eaux.
It took a 36.6% stake in film production house Film par
Film.
In 2001 it acquired 50% of Série Club, bought out
its partners (Canal + and Havas)
in Eurosport and acquired the France Telecom and France
Television stakes in TPS. In 2002 TF1 acquired the 16%
stake in TPS held by Suez (formerly Lyonnaise des Eaux).
It went on to buy a 34.3% stake in Publications Metro
France, publisher of the free daily newspaper Metro,
and 100% of history theme channel Histoire but failed
to acquire a stake in Socpresse
in 2004. In 2005 TF1, M6 and Vivendi
Universal announced agreement about consolidating the
French pay-TV operations of Canal+ and TPS.
In December 2006 TF1 and state broadcaster France Televisions
launched France 24, a 24/7 global all-news service to
rival Al-Jazeera, the BBC
World Service and CNN.
France 24 was dubbed "CNN à la française",
with channels in French and English on cable and satellite
networks in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Washington
DC in addition to a trilingual website in French, English
and Arabic at www.france24.com. An all-Arabic news channel
is scheduled for June 2007 but there appear to be no plans
for broadcasting in Spanish or Mandarin, omitting major
audiences in a nice display of French chauvinism.
The channel - promoted as "news with a French sensibility",
"international news from a French perspective"
and a mission to "convey the values of France throughout
the world" - is expected to receive US$112 million
in annual subsidies from the French government, in addition
to US$35 million in startup funding from the two partners.
studies
There have been no major English-language studies of the
group or Bouygues family, although insights are offered
in Dominique Barjot's 2004 Bouygues, 1952-1989: From
The Building Industry To The Service Sector (txt).
Works in French include Citizen Bouygues ou l'histoire
secrète d'un grand patron (Paris: Belfond
1998) by Campagnac & Nouzille and TF1: un pouvoir
(Paris: Fayard 1997) by Pierre Péan & Christophe
Nick.
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