About Noovo Info

Noovo Info

Noovo Info is the news division of Noovo, Bell Media's French-language television network — a multiplatform news service launched in March 2021, built around the NOOVO LE FIL newscasts, the dedicated digital news site noovo.info, and a youth-oriented strategy spanning Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and newsletters. Headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, Noovo Info is Bell Media's French-language news brand for the streaming era: the journalism arm of the network that Bell relaunched as Noovo in August 2020, competing with TVA Nouvelles and Radio-Canada's information services for the attention of Quebec's francophones.

Overview

Noovo Info is the information service of the Noovo network, owned by Bell Media, a division of BCE Inc. Launched in March 2021 as a multiplatform news offering, it unites the network's television newscasts — broadcast under the NOOVO LE FIL banner — with a dedicated digital news destination at noovo.info and a presence on social platforms aimed at younger audiences. Its tagline, in the brand's own telling, is "l'actualité racontée autrement" — the news told differently.

The service sits within the Noovo network's broader strategy: the former V network, acquired by Bell Media in May 2020 and relaunched as Noovo on August 31, 2020, unifying the conventional channel and the Noovo.ca streaming platform under a single brand aimed at younger francophones and Quebec pop culture. Noovo Info is the news component of that strategy — journalism designed for an audience that consumes information on phones and feeds as much as on television.

The network's history gives the news service its context: launched in 1986 as Télévision Quatre-Saisons (TQS), rebranded as V in 2009 under Remstar, and re-acquired by Bell Media in 2020, the channel has always been Quebec's third French-language network — the challenger to TVA and Radio-Canada. Noovo Info inherits that challenger positioning in news: younger, more digital, and more pop-cultural in tone than its established rivals.

History

Noovo Info was launched in March 2021, seven months after the Noovo rebrand, as Bell Media's multiplatform French-language news service. The launch built on the network's existing information programming — the NOOVO LE FIL newscasts, which air on the Noovo channel and stream on Noovo.ca — and extended it into a full news brand with digital, social, and newsletter components.

The digital cornerstone came with the launch of the dedicated noovo.info website, unveiled as the service's standalone news destination: a site covering breaking news alongside columns and original reporting presented as exclusive. The launch was staffed with an editorial team supplemented by specialists, columnists, and contributors — including physician Dr. Alain Vadeboncoeur, former Plateau-Mont-Royal mayor Luc Ferrandez, and author and comedian Léa Stréliski — a roster designed to give the site distinctive voices beyond straight news.

The service's early journalism included ambitious original reporting: journalist Audrey Ruel-Manseau's "Dans les limbes de la DPJ," an investigation into the dangers of excessive vigilance by Quebec's youth protection directorate (DPJ) — which followed cases where children fell through the cracks, including the widely covered Granby case — exemplified the in-depth reporting the brand promised. The investigation, following a family's ordeal after being suspected of child abuse over marks on a child's skin, demonstrated the service's capacity for the long-form accountability journalism that builds a news brand's credibility.

The launch also reflected Bell Media's broader Quebec strategy: the 2020 unveiling of Noovo.ca and the Noovo app had created a unified digital home for Bell's francophone channels — Noovo, Canal D, Canal Vie, Investigation, VRAK, and Z — with more than 5,000 hours of content, and Noovo Info's dedicated news section within that platform gave the company's French-language journalism a streaming-era home. The standalone noovo.info site, promised at the platform's launch for the following autumn, completed the multiplatform architecture.

Content and Coverage

Noovo Info covers Quebec and Canadian news across the full range of a generalist news service: politics, society, justice, health, the economy, culture, and sports — with the Quebec perspective that defines all of the province's francophone media. Its television newscasts, NOOVO LE FIL, air on the Noovo channel and stream live on Noovo.ca, presented by a team of anchors, journalists, and contributors in the dynamic formats the brand promises: varied points of view treating the day's events from concrete angles anchored in everyday reality.

The noovo.info website extends the newscasts with continuously updated news coverage, columns, and original reporting. The site's columnist roster — including Vadeboncoeur on health, Ferrandez on municipal affairs and politics, and Stréliski on culture and society — gives it a bench of recognizable Quebec voices. Its investigative reporting, in the tradition of Ruel-Manseau's DPJ investigation, pursues the accountability stories that distinguish a news brand.

The service's tone is deliberately distinct from its rivals: "l'actualité racontée autrement" — the news told differently — signals an approach aimed at younger francophones, with formats and angles designed for audiences that find traditional newscasts staid. The assignment of journalists specifically to Instagram and TikTok content creation reflects that strategy: news designed for the feed, not just repurposed for it.

Coverage and Audience

Noovo Info serves the French-speaking audience of Quebec — and francophones across Canada — with a particular focus on younger news consumers. Its audience is the generation that gets its news from phones: the Instagram and TikTok users, the streamers, the newsletter subscribers, the YouTube viewers who encounter the brand's journalism as video.

The service competes in one of the most competitive regional news markets in North America: Quebec's francophone audience is served by TVA Nouvelles (the market leader), Radio-Canada's information services (the public broadcaster's formidable news operation), and a crowded field of digital outlets. Noovo Info's strategy is differentiation by tone and platform: younger, more digital, more pop-cultural — the news brand for francophones who find the established alternatives too conventional.

The brand's YouTube channel, TikTok account, and newsletters extend its reach beyond the television audience, and its social video — news clips packaged for the feed — circulates among Quebec francophones who may never watch a scheduled newscast.

Ownership

Noovo Info is owned by Bell Media, the media division of BCE Inc., Canada's largest communications company. Bell Media's Quebec portfolio includes the Noovo network and its five owned stations, the RDS sports channels, and the francophone specialty channels Canal D, Canal Vie, Investigation, VRAK, and Z — a French-language media empire that gives Noovo Info corporate backing and cross-promotional reach.

The news service operates within Bell Media's Quebec information division, alongside the company's other news assets. Its launch in 2021 represented Bell's investment in original French-language journalism for the Noovo network — a commitment to news as part of the network's identity, not merely as regulatory obligation.

Digital Presence

Noovo Info's digital presence is the core of its identity: the noovo.info website, the Noovo Info section of Noovo.ca (at noovo.ca/noovoinfo), the Noovo app, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and email newsletters. The noovo.info site — the brand's standalone digital news destination — carries breaking news, columns, original reporting, and newsletters, designed for the mobile-first news consumer.

The service's social strategy is among the most deliberate in Quebec news: dedicated journalists creating content for Instagram and TikTok, YouTube distribution of reports and newscast segments, and newsletters that bring the day's news to subscribers' inboxes. For a news brand launched in 2021, digital is not an extension of the broadcast — it is the centre.

For Quebec's francophones, Noovo Info is the news told differently: the journalism of the Noovo network — younger, digital, and multiplatform — still building its audience in the shadow of TVA and Radio-Canada, still betting that the future of French-language news in Quebec belongs to the feed as much as to the newscast.