Telecoms & Medias

Soulier Bunch advises clients across the telecom, data center, and media industries, where technological, contractual, and regulatory challenges intersect. We assist inter alia operators, industrial players, and content platforms with the full range of legal issues that may arise in these strategic business sectors.

Telecoms

We are widely recognized for our expertise in electronic communications law, combining in-depth knowledge of sector-specific challenges (access to civil engineering infrastructure, interconnection, wholesale offers, OTT services, fiber deployment, etc.) and related issues such as data center construction, cloud services, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, digital sovereignty, and industry-specific taxation.

Our hands-on understanding of the telecommunications industry uniquely positions us to anticipate risks, secure investments, and support our clients in their network deployment and innovation projects.

We regularly provide legal and strategic assistance in connection with:

• The design and implementation of complex contractual arrangements, including Indefeasible Right of Use (IRUs), access to underground and aerial civil engineering infrastructure and landing stations, infrastructure sharing, public service concessions for FttH deployment, industrial 5G deployment, hosting and connectivity agreements, subcontracting, data center construction, maintenance agreements, etc.

• M&A transactions involving telecom operators or assets, establishment of joint ventures between operators for telecom network operations, in France and Europe, and merger control filings;

• Regulatory compliance, including assistance with responses to public consultations and data submission requests from ARCEP (the French Regulatory Authority for Electronic Communications, Postal Services and Print Media Distribution), obtaining numbering and frequency resources, implementing regulatory changes, and conducting compliance audits (cybersecurity, service continuity, etc.);

• Dispute resolution and sanction proceedings before ARCEP;

• Litigation between operators before commercial courts (access to wholesale offers, private enforcement actions, contract performance and termination, etc.), between operators and local authorities (concessions, construction and operation of public initiative networks (réseaux d’initiative publique also known as “RIP”), relocation, etc.), and before civil courts against third parties (OTT services, premium-rate number fraud, B2B unpaid invoices, non-compliance with the so-called “anti-damage” regulation, etc.).

Soulier Bunch is also a member of InfraNum (French Professional Association for Digital Infrastructure).

Media

The growing digitalization of content has profoundly reshaped the media industry (audiovisual, film, publishing, press, music, video games), requiring an agile legal approach that integrates business dynamics, regulatory constraints, and the protection of rights.

We advise producers, publishers, broadcasters, platforms, television operators, and creators on:

• Structuring and securing production, broadcasting, and co-production projects;
• Negotiating exploitation, distribution, assignment, and financing agreements;
• Protecting publishers’ related rights (also known as neighboring rights);
• Ensuring compliance with sector-specific rules on advertising, social networks, and influencers;
• Advising on competition law compliance in the media sector, and with the decisions issued by ARCOM (French Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication);
• Assisting publication directors, editors-in-chief and journalists in connection with defamation proceedings;
• Advising and supporting publication directors and editors-in-chief in analyzing and drafting a right of reply.

Representative Work

• Advised a global OTT messaging service provider on the regulatory and tax treatment of its services under French electronic communications and VAT law
• Assisted an operator in the acquisition of a public HFC network, from the request for expressions of interest to the execution of the transfer agreement, as well as in the implementation of wholesale offers (duct leasing, dark fiber leasing, and leased lines) and dealings with civil engineering stakeholders
• Advised an operator on the takeover of a wired network under a public service concession contract and on the implementation of B2C and wholesale offers (IRUs and dark fiber leases, hosting, spectrum sharing, etc.)
• Negotiated compensation and repair arrangements for an operator in connection with the lease of degraded rooftop and tower sites
• Negotiated technical and pricing terms for access to submarine cables and landing stations in the Caribbean
• Assisting in the acquisition of operators awarded public service concession contracts providing enterprise, retail, and wholesale telecom services (backbone and distribution networks, wireless stations, IRU capacity on submarine cables, etc.)
• Negotiated technical and pricing terms of Full and Light MVNO agreements with MNOs
• Assisted a leading French pay-TV group and distributor of premium channels in mediation proceedings concerning the allocation of Ligue 1 football broadcasting rights
• Represented clients in antitrust damages actions in the telecoms sector
• Negotiated commercial leases and the acquisition of serviced land plots for the construction and operation of data centers