('''Canal+''') is a
French Film and
Television studio and distributor. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of
Vivendi Universal and has a film library in excess of 5,000 films.
Vivendi Universal has sold some parts of Canal Plus to private investors which are still using the name of Canal Plus. It is headquartered in
Issy-les-Moulineaux , in the suburbs of
Paris .
In the Netherlands, France and Spain the flagship product is a television channel, Canal+. The channel is encrypted for most of the day; viewers who wish to watch the channel's more popular programming (new-release movies and live sport) must subscribe to the service. Previously this involved the hire of a decoder to decrypt the signal, but increasingly Canal+ is being offered as part of a multi-channel satellite or cable television package (known as CanalSat
Canal Satellite in France and Digital+ in Spain).
Canal Plus came to the Nordic countries in 1997, acquiring the two
FilmNet -channels and renaming them. The Nordic part was sold in October 2003 and the Canal+ brand is since then used with license.
Formerly Canal Satellite Numérique, a pay
Satellite and
ADSL Television distributor (as CanalSAT DSL).
Canal+ Spain became a full-time encrypted channel in Spain in November 2005. It moved to subscription-based satellite TV service
Digital+ operated by
Sogecable , in which Canal+ parent company Vivendi has a shareholding.
Cuatro ("four" in Spanish) a new
Free-to-air station from Sogecable became available in the former Canal+ frequencies in terrestrial (both digital and analogue).
Cuatro's owners asked the Spanish government to change the broadcasting license conditions from a partially encrypted station into a 24-hour
FTA channel. The council of ministers officially gave its permission in
July 29th ,
2005 ; This move is intended to help boost Sogecable revenues from advertising.
The main staples of Canal+ are
Spanish Football and recent movies. The
Satirical Puppet Show ''
Las Noticias Del Guiñol '' was broadcasted uncrypted and has been maintained in Cuatro as ''
Los Guiñoles De Canal+ ''.
