Montreal: The head of a consortium applying for control of Television Quatre Saisons says a newly purposed network will narrow its mandate and ‘stay away from’ original independent drama production.

‘It means spreading our resources too thinly and it’s a very risky business,’ says Franklin Delaney, president and ceo of the Quebec-led consortium. ‘That [original drama production] is one of the reasons why you have such huge losses in the last 10 years, trying to be as big as the other two [networks].’

In recent years, tqs has competed with Radio-Canada and the TVA Network in the domestic drama category by commissioning two four-hour miniseries per year from indie producers, including such productions as Le Masque, 10-07, Innocence and Misericorde.

In the year ahead, the consortium intends to add service-style programs to a largely news, light entertainment and cinema schedule, but says it will closely re-examine its commitment to costly professional sports.

At July 7 crtc hearings in Montreal, the consortium intends to hold the line on independent production and acquisition spending at the current $10 million a year level, topping up the commitment by $1.85 million over the five-year licence. The crtc is scheduled to render a decision on the sale by Aug. 22.

In view of tqs’ losses of $150 million over 10 years, Delaney says ‘the biggest benefit that we could offer is the benefit of survival.’

However, there is a benefits package consisting of $50,000 over five years for the Alliance for Children and Television, $250,000 for hearing impaired research, and $250,000 for the Centre de recherche sur les medias.

Quebecor and its partners have offered Videotron $25 million as the buying price for tqs, based on an assumption that price excludes a profit margin for the seller.

The consortium is chaired by Wilbrod Gauthier, a longtime senior Quebecor executive, and is composed of Communications Quebecor (58.5%), Cancom (19.5%), Cogeco (20%), and the operators of regional tqs affiliate stations Radio-Nord, Radio Saguenay and Television mbs. Delaney says an additional $15 million for operating contingencies will be added to the estimated $25 million acquisition price.

tqs averaged a 12 share of the viewing audience this year with revenues of just under $50 million. For fiscal ’96/97, ending Aug. 31, Videotron will assume all financial losses, projected to be in the $7 million range.

tqs will continue to lease its Ogilvy Avenue office and studio facilities from Videotron. The same facility houses cfcf-tv, recently acquired by WIC Western International Communications, and a Quebec minority partner.

Delaney says the tqs consortium intends to raise the synergy between tqs and cfcf. ‘We’re going to have a close look at this,’ he says.

The network may also be looking for synergies from its new majority owner’s other media outlets, especially its two daily newspapers, Journal de Montreal and Journal de Quebec.

In a meeting with tqs staff on May 1, Delaney said the network’s first challenge will be to bring revenues in line with market share.