The Flemish media regulator VRM has consistently branded the market as “highly concentrated”, with, as of its 2019 report, the so-called “Big 5” media companies owning and controlling 80 to 100 per cent of all Flemish legacy (news) media (VRM, 2019a). Flanders only boasts a population of roughly 6.5 million people, leading to a handful of key players. Of the just seven paid-for daily newspapers, four are owned and published by one company, Mediahuis. Only a few years ago, there were still nine companies present holding the majority of (news) media, but a recent tidal wave of media mergers and acquisitions has brought sweeping changes to the small market.
Most notably, the main commercial television player, Medialaan, and the second-largest newspaper publisher, De Persgroep, announced their merger in 2018, and as of 2020, they operate as one company called DPG Media, with all their newsrooms grouped together in one building in Antwerp. Other recent cases of media mergers have created previously unseen degrees of vertical and diagonal integration, with Belgian telecommunications company Telenet not only providing cable broadband services, but in March 2018 also acquiring De Vijver Media. Since then, the company also owns a number of television stations, among which is the second-largest commercial channel.
Amidst the recent changes in ownership structure, the public broadcaster VRT has managed to maintain its dominant position over free-to-air television and especially radio broadcasting, with market shares of over 35 per cent for its three channels and close to 60 per cent for its five radio channels (CIM, 2020). At the time of writing, VRT’s new five-year management contract with the Flemish government was being negotiated, with private players having expressed their hope for VRT to limit its online news offering to video and to enter the joint venture of the two main commercial players in setting up a designated Flemish SVoD (streaming video-on-demand) service.
