Hello, and welcome to the TF1 H1 2022 results. My name is Andrea, and I'll be your coordinator for today's event. Please note for the duration of the call, your lines will be on listen only. However, you will have the opportunity to ask questions. This can be done by pressing star one on your telephone keypad to register your question. If you require assistance at any point, please press star zero and you will be connected to an operator. I will now hand over to your host, Gilles Pélisson, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Philippe Denery, Chief Financial Officer, to begin today's conference. Thank you.
Welcome everyone. Very happy to be sharing our group's first half results with you this morning. As I hope you will see, they are quite satisfactory. First of all, I will go on the first slide, saying, you know what this presentation will be all about. We will be sharing the highlights of this first half, the activity review, then Philippe will go take you through the financial results and financial performance. Finally, we will give you an update on the group outlook for the months coming ahead of us. First of all, let's look at the highlights of this first half of 2022. The key highlights are the following.
Regarding the media, the media sector, very strong performance of, thanks to a premium line-up on linear and non-linear, attracting commercial target. We remain a strong leader with stable ratings at 33.5% on women under 50 and 30.1% on the target 25-49. Very strong operational focus on our side on the convergence between TV and digital streaming. Very successful rollout of MyTF1 Max, which was our first attempt to offer a pay service to our audiences, especially on OTT, combined with social video content. All in all, we are very pleased having this new brick in our house. A ramp-up of the addressable TV. We have been talking for many months about addressable TV.
Now it's starting to take off in France. You know, dynamic digital ad revenues with MyTF1. We're talking about 25% increase in sales from MyTF1. Finally, very important, the successful disposal of assets on the non-core part between, you know, founders having no further impact on our accounts based on those disposals, and social stability, which was also one of our main concerns. On the Newen side, it's the strengthening of Newen on growth markets, both thanks to talents and label acquisition recently in the UK with Joi Productions. In Denmark, it was Real Lava. In Spain, we opened with the partnership of a prominent Spanish actor Capa Spain, focusing on documentary format. Productions delivered, like the Gremlins to Warner.
Soon to be delivered, Liaison, the first major Apple TV+ production in Europe, based in France and in England. Marie Antoinette, which is for the Canal+ Group. Under development, The Hunt for Jasper S., which is for Viaplay, the platform out of Scandinavia in Northern Europe. In terms of key figures, consolidated revenue, it's a strong increase of 5.2% at EUR 1,186 million. The group advertising revenues are strong for the semester at EUR 815 million, with 1.6% increase. The second quarter was a little more challenging than the first one. Newen Studios revenue at EUR 158 million, it's a 9% increase.
All in all, it's a current operating profit, which is progressing very nicely at EUR 189 million. It's a 11.6% increase. The margin rate, you know, which has always been our challenge at TF1, at 15.9% for the semester and for the second quarter, it's over 20%. In terms of free cash flow, it's a nice progress. We are at EUR 123 million, all in all, which you know, is quite satisfactory. In terms of activity review, let's go now to the media part. I just wanted to touch again on the consumption of TV consumption, so what we call the daily watching rate for viewers. We are still at a strong 3 hours and 22 minutes in France.
It's 2019, which is the reference year, you know, if you take out the pandemic impact of 2020 and 2021. We are the first media in terms of what we call the attention market. You can see that there are challenges on the younger audiences, which are decreasing, but nevertheless, a very strong reach. The strong reach, you have it on the second slide, on slide eight, whereby we focused on the fact that, you know, we are reaching more people than ever. Altogether 4 years old and plus, it's 43.7 million. It is a progress compared to 2019. In terms of women under 50, we are at 6.9, and the 25-49, you are at 13.2, which is also a very strong presence.
In terms of the ratings, if I jump to that, I just wanted to reemphasize how strong was the 33.5% market share, you know, that we have on the women under 50 and the 31.1%. As you can see, compared to our main competitor, the M6 Group, it's a strong performance. France Télévisions has been helped by the Olympic Games, especially on the first part of the first half of the year. When we move to channel by channel, you see the 33.5 for the group.
You see that, the TF1 channel, which is the leader in France, has, you know, increased its gap with the M6 channel, which, you know, is a strong performance. TMC is also performing quite well, TFX. The good news, especially on the 25-49, is the performance of, you know, both TF1, TMC, which for us are, you know, very significant. Finally, LCI, our all-news channel, has benefited, of course, from a very strong news flow in the first half, thanks to the political activity in France with the presidential race. We covered it, I think fairly well and, the audience went up, jumped up to 1.6%, which is a 0.5-point increase.
A few years ago, we were wondering whether we could reach 1.0, so you see, how much we have made progress. Of course, the war in Ukraine, how unfortunate it is, has been also the, you know, a reason to watch all-news channel, which are altogether progressing quite well. Moving to our record audience, of course, the ratings are supported by very strong content, very unique content as HPI, which is really the best French series for more than 10 years. The first season was launched at 10.9 TV viewers. This second season has been at 8 or 9 million, which is really very, very significant.
Now we are also benefiting from a very strong replay at 25%. Making this a huge success. It is also, you will see that in a few slides, distributed now in over 100 countries, which makes it also, as Newen is capitalizing on this because they are in charge of the distribution, a very nice project internally to the group. In terms of entertainment, very strong performance in terms of brands which are well-established in France. We have now three entertainment shows weekly. On Tuesday, Koh-Lanta at 38% market share. Then there is on Friday, Mask Singer at 39%, and then The Voice always on Saturday at 32%.
It is more our capabilities to retain those, franchise, make them, very much, modern, current, reactivate them season after season. One good news was also, of course, the Champions League final. That was a game which was largely, vastly commented, not only for the results, but also for the lack of organization in France. Nevertheless, it got some strong audience. It started late, half an hour. We couldn't benefit from that in terms of advertising, because we are capped at 12 minutes. Nevertheless, at the end of the day, it was strong ratings, 38% in France. Although there was no French team, but a lot of French players on the field. 38% for women under 50 and 44% in 25-49.
In terms of news, it was really TF1 being the leader on all major news events. Whether it was the presidential election. Strong ratings. You're talking about 7.3 million people watching for the first round and 7.2 million for the final call with the election of Mr. Macron. The Ukraine war coverage and of course, which you know, the presidential election was followed by the National Assembly election, which was also very strongly followed. If we move now to MyTF1, here the story is really that you know, as we consider that from now on, it is kind of the focus point of the company for the coming years with not only a replay platform but then an AVOD player.
The name of the game is really to expand our reach in digital. Of course, we are the first free TV replay platform with now 26.5 million catch-uppers at the end of June. Altogether, it's 1.2 billion videos watched. It is a decrease versus 2021, but you know, there was the pandemic. There are now we have TF1 Max, which is also taking away some viewership. Altogether, very satisfactory result. There is nothing to worry about. Here, it's really very strong performance, and we are, you know, continuing our expansion. Very satisfactory also ratings with 4.3 on the App Store and 4.0 on the Google Play Store. It's an optimized user experience via the tech.
As you can see, whether it's our daily soap regarding the diversification of our ad revenue streams. As I mentioned in the first part, altogether EUR 815 million revenues. The dynamic on our advertising revenues is strong, yet you have dynamic sectors like finance, banking, travel, and tourism, which are bouncing back. However, you know, cars and food are still segments and industries which are watching their investments, decreasing their investment, therefore compensated by the others. On the right side of the slide, you have the ramp-up of addressable TV. What is really important here is that it's the 302 campaigns to this point. 257 active advertisers, half of them are new.
For us, it's new kind of medium and small accounts which we normally don't attract on TF1 and which are coming through addressable TV, which confirms everything we have seen in the rest of Europe for countries which are more advanced than France. If we move now to the Newen Studios, a sustained activity from our recurring business, which is quite satisfactory. We were able to distribute, so HPI's, as I mentioned, over 100 countries through Newen Connect, which is the name of our entity for distributing content. The daily soaps, of course, continue to be very unique, now characterizing both in France but also in the rest of Europe with the dimension of what we are able to achieve at Newen in line with a strong TV broadcaster.
In terms of Reel One, in Canada, the American and Canadian company, 36 TV movies were delivered, so we are on our way to delivering over 100 TV movies this year, which is a significant increase. I remind you that when we bought the company, they were producing like 50 TV movies a year. It's a significant increase, and we are very, very pleased with the performance. The target of what we told you a few couple of years ago that one day 50% of the revenues of Newen would come from outside of France has been reached. Producing new and high content, of course, that's the name of the game for Newen.
I mentioned the Gremlins, so this is the subsidiary in animation, Blue Spirit, for Warner Bros. Liaison, I mentioned, and Marie Antoinette, which are produced by Ringside and Léonis in France, Capa. For Viaplay in the Netherlands, it's in Holland, The Hunt for Jasper S. These are really significant projects that we are very proud and which show you the diversity of the content that a group like Newen from now on can produce in Europe. It's also investment in talent, with the talent acquisition, which of course, is the basis for the growth of the company for the future. Here you can see, you know, through Thomas Anargyros, Joy, I will try Gharoro-Akpojotor
For Joi Productions, we call her Joy. Real Lava, very major production in documentary in Denmark. Then Flare, of course, it was our acquisition with Martin Heisler in Germany. In terms of now the financial results, I will let Philippe go and present our achievements.
Well, thank you, Gilles. Good morning, everyone. Moving on to the half year results, I will start with revenues for the TF1 Group. Consolidated revenue of the TF1 Group reached EUR 1,186.9 million, +EUR 58.2 million year-over-year, and +EUR 42 million versus 2019 same period. Revenues for the media segment increased by EUR 45.1 million year-over-year. It reflects a 1.6% increase in advertising revenue. That's to say EUR 13.1 million year-over-year, thanks to the strong performance of advertising revenues in Q1 for 2022. Digital ad revenues are up by EUR 2 million due to a significant increase of revenues from MyTF1 and a slowdown from our website ad revenues. Other revenues within the media segment are up by EUR 32 million year-over-year.
This results from a combination of strong activity as compared to last year in digital marketing, growing revenues from distribution, and recovery from entertainment activities such as shows and concerts. Moving on to Newen Studios revenues, they are up by EUR 13.1 million year-on-year. Newen Studios activity benefited this half year from the positive contribution of Spanish and German studios, iZen and Flare, which were acquired in 2021. International revenues stand at EUR 84.9 million, up by EUR 28.4 million versus last year, of which EUR 21.1 million is due to a perimeter effect. As Gilles just mentioned, Newen's international activity now stand at 54% of total revenues contribution to the group. Let's now focus on Q2. Revenues from the media segment in Q2 2022 are up by EUR 4.1 million year-on-year.
It reflects a 1.4% decrease in advertising revenue. That's to say, minus EUR 6.2 million year-on-year. The slight decrease is due to an unfavorable basis of comparison with the broadcasting of UEFA Euro 2020, and it includes a perimeter effect of EUR 2.5 million with a disposal in 2021 of websites abroad, namely in Germany and in the States. Excluding the perimeter effect from the disposal of websites abroad, Q2 2022 revenues are up by 1% versus Q2 2019. Other revenues within the media segment are up by EUR 10.3 million year-on-year, namely in our distribution and entertainment business, offsetting the decrease of advertising revenues. Moving on to Newen Studios revenues, they are up plus EUR 2.6 million year-on-year.
As we have explained before, Newen Studios activity benefited from the positive contribution of newly acquired European studios, Spain and Germany, as well as a pickup of activity in content distribution in Canada, as Gilles has developed and mentioned. Moving now to programming costs. Programming costs for H1 2022 totaled EUR 440.6 million versus EUR 466.4 million in H1 2021. They are down by EUR 25.8 million versus last year. This performance demonstrates our ability to control our costs and generate savings when necessary, while maintaining a powerful lineup and our leadership in audience ratings. To give you more details, we benefited from a favorable basis of comparison versus last year when we broadcasted the Euro 2020.
On top of this, in an uncertain context where we were anticipating some slight slowdown of ad revenues in June, we have been able to adjust our grids and make some savings to compensate. This also allowed us to broadcast high-quality political shows covering the French presidential and parliamentary election, as Gilles already said, as well as the ongoing situation in Ukraine. Concerning the current operating profit amount, it amounted to EUR 188.7 million, up by EUR 19.6 million year-on-year, and up by EUR 25.7 million versus 2019. It leads to a margin rate of 15.9%, plus 0.9 points versus 2021 and plus 1.7 versus 2019.
If we now look into the different segments, the current operating profit for the media segment stands at EUR 171.3 million, +EUR 23.9 million year-on-year, leading to a current operating margin of 16.7%. The margin rate is up by 1.7 versus last year. It reflects the increase of top-line revenues combined to the contribution of related activities such as distribution, as well as effective management of programming costs, as I mentioned previously, especially in Q2. Please note that the current operating profit from last year included a 2021 one-off tax benefit linked with the COVID pandemic. Newen Studios posted a current operating profit of EUR 17.4 million, down by EUR 4.3 million year-on-year, and a current operating margin rate of 11%.
Newen returned to its usual level of profitability in the first half of the year after a first quarter marked by the seasonality of its activity. Let's now focus on Q2. The current operating profit amounted to EUR 129 million, up by EUR 16.8 million year-on-year. It leads to a margin, as Gilles mentioned, of 20.6%, plus 2.5 points as compared to 2021. If we now look into the different segment, the current operating profit for the media segment stands at EUR 114.4 million, plus EUR 13.8 million year-on-year, leading to a current operating margin rate of 21.1%.
The margin rate on the Q2 is up by 2.4 points versus last year. Concerning Newen Studios, they posted a current operating profit at EUR 14.7 million, + EUR 3.1 million year-on-year, and a current operating margin rate of 17.8%, +3 points year-on-year. This strong increase reflects the growth in revenues in Q2 and a positive contribution from distribution activities in Canada, as Gilles previously said. Now, regarding the consolidated income statement, I have already commented on the consolidated revenue, the cost of programs, and the current operating profit per segment.
Other charges, depreciation, amortization, and provisions are up by EUR 64.4 million in H1 2022, linked to higher production costs from Newen Studios, which acquired two new studios, as already mentioned, and a tax credit of EUR 21 million recognized in our June 2021 accounts on this line. It is also explained by the pickup of activity in our entertainment business after a first semester last year, which was marked by COVID restrictions. Non-current expenses linked with the TF1 M6 merger project are recognized in our accounts for the amount of EUR 6.9 million. Share of losses of associates stand at EUR 12 million, down by EUR 1.4 million, which are explained by the investment in the Salto platform.
The net profit attributable to the group stands at EUR 126.5 million for H1 2022, up by EUR 18.1 million, +16.7%, in line with the increase in the revenues and the current operating profit. Let's now comment on the balance sheet of the group at the end of June 2022. Shareholder equity attributable to the group was EUR 1,812.5 million at end of June 2022, out of total balance sheet of EUR 3,734.2 million. At end of June, we booked our assets held for sale, namely Icon and the publisher activity, in both held for sale assets and operations and liabilities related to held for sale operations. No capital loss was incurred at end of June 2022.
The closing of the disposal of the publisher activity is expected in the second half of the year. The Ykone deal closed yesterday. The group reported net cash of EUR 245.2 million at the end of June 2022. The decrease versus Q1, EUR 279 million, is mainly due to the dividend payments and partly to a higher working capital requirement than that at end of March 2022, which is a seasonal effect, as you know. The group has a sound financial position with no debt and access to available bilateral credit facility of around EUR 1 billion.
Now if we turn to the trend in net cash position for H1 2022, closing net surplus cash stands at EUR 245.2 million at the end of June 2022, up by EUR 210.9 million year-on-year. The operating cash flow stands at EUR 287.4 million, despite higher results. The slight decrease versus last June is mainly due to a higher tax paid than last year during the same period. The negative figure of EUR 13.5 million in our change in operating working capital is mainly due to the increase of advance payments for our program and content. It's a seasonal effect, and it is lower than last year, thanks to delivery of programs at Newen.
The level of net capital expenditures is up by EUR 20 million, explained by higher investment in Newen linked with the integration in 2021 of new studios and higher expected delivery in H2. The level of Salto shareholders' loan and dividend stands at EUR 122.1 million, mainly linked to the 2021 dividend payment for around EUR 95 million, as well as the financing of Salto for EUR 14 million. I will now leave the floor to Gilles to comment on our ESG performance.
Yes, thanks, Philippe. We thought we would take just one example of a strong commitment of the company on sustainability. As we know, it is very important to investors in today's world. As you know, through the ad sales teams that we have and, of course, the organization, we can definitely act and help to raise consumer awareness in terms of sustainability.
The way the eco-funding has been set up was to sell advertisers, if your ad spot displays an environmental criterion recommended by the French authority, which is ADEME, and which, you know, has some label, energy label, repairability index, or environmental labeling, then you will be, your campaign will trigger a free contribution to a fund that we have set up, which is a green fund. This funding, you know, in turn will finance an awareness raising campaign with good, you know, way of behaving in daily life, making the fact that, you know, then you can behave as good corporate and responsible citizens. The initiative we had set up was like a EUR 5 million gross term fund for the year.
When you look at the results, you know, we are very pleased with the way we have been followed in this initiative. You're talking about now, in six months, 25 campaigns. We are over 63% now of the target that we had set up. Most importantly, we have 14 advertisers, and among those, as you can see, you have national brands, international brands, which have committed to the effort. At the end, you're talking about 193 awareness spots, which were broadcast on TF1 Group channels and MyTF1. Which is, you know, our way as a showcase to contribute to, you know, responsible advertising, which I think is very important that we play an active role in this.
If I move now to the outlook for the second half of the year and the years coming ahead. First of all, you know, coming in September, a very strong lineup of back to school period with very strong brands. Of course, in fiction, we will have two major, you know, I think events, which will be Syndrome E, which is a fiction from a famous French author, Franck Thilliez, which has great reviews. It is now in premiere viewing on Salto, and it has very, very significant reviews. There will be the big event for TF1, which will be Les Combattantes.
It's First World War fiction with the same trio of actresses that we had in the Bazar de la Charité, the charity bonfire, which it is again a partnership with Netflix, so the major funding is done by TF1, but with Netflix as a partner, so also highly visible program. There will be of course the FIFA World Cup in Qatar. This is end of November until mid-December. It will be exclusively on TF1 in France. The significant impact on our programming will be that we will get 20 prime time viewing at eight o'clock, so four weeks. This has never happened on our channel.
Meaning by that we will be, we will have to move forward the newscast, the 8:00 P.M. news to a 7:00 P.M. or 7:15 P.M. news, but with a very unique programming. Hopefully, as the French team lately has been quite good and they are the world champion, we hope to have significant impact. There will be the return of the Star Academy in a very modern and reinvented way, with 7 prime time events. It will be, there will be one daily show in access, but most importantly, it will be live from the set from 4:00 P.M. to midnight every afternoon. In terms of recruiting teenagers, very important for this part of the population.
We have great hopes that it will create some very positive buzz, and therefore, you know, as I said, using MyTF1 to attract a younger audience. In conclusion, in terms of outlook, as you can see, it's a strong lineup for the second part of the year with, of course, the World Cup and then all these major events and very unique content. More than ever, our belief in the convergence between television and digital is confirmed through, you know, expanding our reach with a very agile resource allocation and especially the 100 movies that you will have as a catalog on MyTF1.
Significant deliveries, as you know, we know that you don't like too much the fact that it is not a linear repartition through the quarters of deliveries from Newen. Here you can expect in the second half significant deliveries from Newen, so a good second half of the year. Then finally, of course, our you know plan of acquiring the M6 Group, you know, following the sale by RTL is going on.
As you may have seen during the week, the four groups, both the shareholders and the two companies, issued a press release, mentioning that in the first report of the competition authority's investigation teams, a number of significant competition concerns were raised, and that generated, of course. Their nature and their extent, as mentioned in the report, could mean that the merger plans that we have as they stand would no longer be meaningful to the parties, therefore, you know, would lead us to give up on such a major project. We do believe the fundamentals of the project haven't changed. More importantly, you know, while it is a very long process in France, the process has been, you know, followed up by the authorities and by the Antitrust Authority.
The world has kept changing, as we have seen with platforms and so forth. Therefore, we will go out, you know, to the end of the process, which is basically, first of all, providing the authority with some responses to this report in the next three weeks. We will have hearings with the board of the authority, which ultimately is the decision-maker, and that will be held on the fifth and the sixth of September. You can expect some final call and decision by mid-October. That's what we wanted to share with you this morning, and we are now ready to answer your question with Philippe.
Thank you. Our question-answer session will start now. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind and wish to withdraw your question, please press star two. You will be advised when to ask your question. The first question comes from the line of Conor O'Shea from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you. Good morning, everybody. Three questions from my side. Firstly, if you could maybe have some comments on the early bookings for the TV advertising in September. I think your peers said that so far they were, you know, in line with expectations, so no major step change in the market. Can you confirm that's what you're seeing? Secondly, could you maybe comment a little bit on the thinking behind the disposal of the digital business in this quarter? You know, why you made that decision and what your digital strategy is going forward.
Thirdly, just on the merger, obviously seen the comments this week, but I understand that it's not unusual for the antitrust to not necessarily follow the opinion of their service d'instruction team, that this was what happened in the merger of Fnac and Darty. I wonder if you could just give some comments, what your understanding of how that procedure tends to work in the majority of cases. Thank you.
Okay. Well, on the bookings coming up, as you know, the summer is not the strongest months in advertising, for anybody. July and August are in that, you know, category.
Mm-hmm.
Europe. You know, we have the women's Euro competition in soccer, which is held in England. Unfortunately, we lost France last night against Germany. We were happy to see the French team going to the semis, which they have never done in the past. For us, it was fairly good news. I just saw the ratings. It was 6.2 million people watched the game last night. You know, we are very happy with this. This is beyond our expectation. Therefore, you know, not bad for July. Of course, we have always the competition of Tour de France, et cetera, et cetera.
Mm-hmm.
against us from the French public service. Looking at September, we see a normal trend, good trend. No weakening, particularly of the market. It is too early to say.
Mm.
About the last quarter. It's just the strong lineup we have, you know, makes us fairly confident that except if there is a major recession that we haven't anticipated at this stage because there is no reason to.
Mm.
Otherwise, you know, we should have a good performance on the fourth quarter given the lineup, the World Cup, Star Academy and you know, all the other program I just mentioned. On the disposal of assets in the digital field, it is really you know, coming to the conclusion that you know, if we entered back in I would say 2017, 2018 into two major diversification at the TF1 level, which were on one side, the production with the acquisition of Newen as a French studio, and then developing, making a lot of acquisition and building up a very significant international group, as you saw just now.
Our trip into moving into digital, and when I say digital, it was mostly display and special ops kind of digital portals was not as successful. Very much, you know, endangered by the pandemic, where all advertising stopped. Major play by the GAFAMs with Facebook and others, changing the rules and affecting the capability of smaller players to play. The largest competitor in France, Webedia, is said to be for sale. This sector has been significantly affected. At the end of the day, as you know, a couple of years ago, we took a write-off of EUR 75 million, which we did couple of years ago. The story was, you know, what do we do with that, those businesses.
In some instances, we had founders and, like Gamned! and Ykone that Philippe just mentioned. Those founders wanted to keep developing their groups, and those groups are in great shape. They were attractive to different investors. On one side, Gamned! was HLD, which is the Lafonta Group, which, you know, we were happy to sell with the two founders staying on board. Ykone will be the same with the BinDawood Group out of Saudi Arabia, which has also been closed today or yesterday. You know, these have no impact on our accounts. You know, we are pleased with that. Then the publisher group, which was all the major brands that we had acquired from Lagardère, from aufeminin, from Axel Springer, et cetera.
Once they were consolidated, we created a unique advertising platform, an ad sales team. We created a unique data platform. All together, you know, they became a little group, which was, you know, an entity in itself with strong brands like Marmiton, like aufeminin, like Doctissimo, health, food, female, you know, attention. All that was attractive to several buyers. At the end, Reworld came up with a very good price, significant offer. They are located in Boulogne, next to our offices, so no trauma for the teams. They committed to keep all the people, which was also important for us. You know, at the end, we closed this deal, which should be closed in December, by December. You know, it's one way of reconfiguring our group.
It's making also cash entries into the group, so you will see that on the balance sheet at the end of the year. Which will put us in a position of reinvesting in, you know, other businesses, in production, certainly, which remains, you know, a key area for us. Enabling us also to grow in technology, whatever, you know, all the, you know. Thanks to, you know, to follow the strategy, mainly focusing on, you know, streaming and linear content. Finally, on the merger, you can't count on me to give you some, you know, percentage of chances that whether the board will override the report from the services. Yes, there are a few instances where the board contradicted maybe the analysis of the services, but they are very few.
You know, most of the time, the board follows the recommendation of the services, which seems fairly logical. What we will be trying to do is to keep up making, you know, making the board sensitive to all the issues which are raised. From now on, we see, you know, the move of platforms like Netflix changing their policy, moving suddenly to advertising, when I think nobody in the investment world, in the investment community or in the consumer world, could ever imagine that Reed Hastings would go after advertising after all those years of being a very significant SVOD player with no advertising and only based on subscription. We just saw that Facebook sales decreased, which is new. You know, we always thought that, you know, the trees will go to the sky.
There are significant changes in the environment. The pressure for talent is still very much on. The fundamentals of the analysis of Bouygues saying, you know, upon our recommendation at TF1, saying we should commit, we should consolidate, we should build on, we should make alliances, and, you know, let's try to make this acquisition work, remains intact. Yet, at some point, if we cannot convince or if, you know, for the authorities, it is certainly too early for them to recognize those changes in the relevant market which we are competing in. It is no more linear television. It is not only linear and nonlinear television and digital, but those markets are really converging significantly. We hear that every day from advertisers.
We see that in their behavior. Maybe we are not capable of convincing this time, but, you know, we know that's coming up. That's what is ahead of us. We will have one last run, beginning of September, and then, you know, the board will make its decision.
Okay. Very good. Just one follow-up on that on the changing environment. Over what timeframe do you think that the arrival of Netflix with an advertising product can have a material impact on the French TV?
Material, we don't know yet how successful they will be. I think what, at the latest, we're talking about in France, because I don't know if it's a rollout throughout the world, but I think we're talking late 2022 or 2023. I think that's what we would be looking for.
Okay. Very clear. Many thanks.
Thank you.
Just a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad to register your question. Thank you. There are no further questions.
Okay.
We have now come to the end of this Q&A session. Thank you for joining today's call. You may now disconnect your line.
Okay. Thank you to all of you, and have a good summer.
Thank you. Bye-bye.