 In 1985, Georges Fillioud, French Minister of Transport, charged Pierre Desgraupes with creating programmes for one or more of the five channels of the high power satellite TDF 1 launched in 1988.On 27 February 1986, La Société d'édition de programmes de télévision was created by Bernard Faivre d'Arcier, cultural adviser to the Prime Minister Laurent Fabius and began to develop a stock of programmes.It was chaired by historian George Duby.