France Telecom's Orange is in talks to buy a stake of between 30 percent and 50 percent in video-sharing web site Dailymotion, a blog on the website of French weekly L'Express said on Friday.

Orange declined to comment on the report, which did not cite a specific source.

Dailymotion was not immediately available for comment.

In an e-mailed invitation on Friday, France Telecom said its chief executive Stephane Richard will hold a news conference on January 25 to unveil a new development in Orange's content strategy. It did not provide further details.

France Telecom, also known by its brand name Orange, is changing its content strategy as part of a plan by Richard to spur growth and restore worker morale after more than 30 staff committed suicide.

Earlier this week, Orange and French pay-TV group Canal Plus unveiled a strategic partnership, merging their cinema channels.

The blog put the value of Dailymotion at around 200 to 250 million euros ($270.7 million to $338.3 million), a far cry from the $1.65 billion Google paid to buy YouTube in 2006.

France's sovereign fund FSI, owner of close to 14 percent of France Telecom, invested 7.5 million euros in Dailymotion in October 2009.

($1=.7389 Euro)

(Reporting by Julien Ponthus and Dominique Vidalon; Editing by Jon Loades-Carter)

Google