Significant reduction in the value of all licensed rights.

The Commission claims that its proposal would respect the contractual freedom to licence rights on a territorial basis and, thus, would not affect the value of rights. In reality, it is very difficult – even impossible – for producers to contractually limit the exploitation of rights via technical means in respect of one of their main financing partners, the public service broadcasters.

This is especially true because the rights affected by the proposed Regulation are often negotiated together with the exclusive primary rights, and are licensed to the broadcaster directly in a package with the primary television rights. In terms of bargaining power, the producer will mostly be forced to accept the terms demanded by the public service broadcaster for e.g. the catch-up rights.