PARIS (Reuters) - French Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron has urged Orange to consider possible European buyers of its Dailymotion video-sharing website, without ruling out other international options, two people close to the matter said.
The government's intervention harks back to 2013 when an earlier plan to sell Dailymotion to Yahoo Inc for around 300 million euros (218.66 million pounds) was scuppered by former industry minister Arnaud Montebourg, who opposed the start-up falling into U.S. hands.
Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) was said to be interested in early 2014, but nothing came of this.
The telecom operator has been seeking a partner, preferably abroad, to help Dailymotion expand internationally to try to compete with larger rival YouTube, owned by Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL). In February Orange acknowledged being in talks with Asia's PCCW, but dismissed press reports that the talks were exclusive.
"There cannot be exclusive negotiations, all options must be looked at, taking into account the stakes in terms of European digital sovereignty," a source close to Macron said, confirming a report in Le Monde newspaper.
"That doesn't mean they can't pick the Chinese option, it means the operator must look at all the options."
An Orange spokesman said all options remained open. The French state is the biggest shareholder in Orange with about 25 percent.
Dailymotion counts 128 million unique visitors per month compared with 1 billion for Google's YouTube, and achieves less than 100 million euros in sales.