Canal+ has officially confirmed its interest in a merger of Poland’s two leading digital satellite platforms Cyfra+ and Wizja TV. Although there have been suggestions of a meeting of minds for some months this is the first time that either party has admitted it might be interested in a merger.

Cyfra+ currently has 337,000 subscribers while UPC had reached 304,000 subscribers at the end of March. UPC has been the owner of Wizja TV for the past year, but does not have a Polish broadcasting licence and continues to broadcast from Maidstone in the UK.

Canal+ financial manager Richard Lenormand, told Reuters that the Polish market simply did not have the room for more than one player.

Cyfra+ and Wizja TV both continue to stage aggressive fights in their campaign for subscribers. Cyfra+ has further competition from Polsat that has recently commenced broadcasting at the same Eutelsat Hot Bird position.

Since last autumn Cyfra+ has been offering a free set-top box to would be subscribers – an offer which was extended just before Easter. In contrast Wizja TV increased its subscription prices by between 7 and 10 per cent before launching its own free box ‘0 zloty’ campaign.

Cyfra+ continues to enjoy a rough ride from the Polish press, most notablly Gazeta Wyborcza, despite the fact that it has gained 10 per cent more subscribers than Wizja TV, which after two years is still short of its projected 500,000 predicted for its fitsy year. It is estimated that Canal+ has lost between 17 and 25 million in the past year suggesting that the cost of gaining a single subscriber is three times lower for Cyfra+ than it is for Wizja.

Any merger between Cyfra and Wizja is likely to see off the challenge from Polsat, whose attempts to establish a third way has shown few signs of success.