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Boss of Universal parent discusses synergies within the group, and beyond into his advertising empire at Havas
By Chris Cooke | Published on Friday 3 June 2016
The boss of Universal Music parent company Vivendi has been discussing synergies between the different companies in the group and, perhaps more interestingly, between Vivendi firms and the separate marketing services business Havas, in which he is the majority shareholder.
Investor Vincent Bolloré, who now controls 14.3% of Vivendi’s shares and 25% of the voting rights, engineered his way into the Chairman role at the French conglom back in 2014, of course, and has since overseen a number of acquisitions, spending a cash pile created before his tenure by the offloading of the firm’s gaming and tel co assets.
Much of that cash pile has gone on, erm, gaming and tel co assets. Which, Bolloré concedes in a new interview in the Financial Times, might seem a little odd. But, says he: “It’s like a painter. You may not know why there’s a blob of blue and a dash of brown but in the end you will see that we are painting something that is relevant”.
The picture Bolloré seemingly wants Vivendi to paint is of a global media giant with interests across the entertainment industry, on par with the big American media and entertainment businesses. Which does sound rather like the grand Vivendi plan of the Edgar Bronfman Jr and Jean-Marie Messier era that began in the late 1990s. A plan that came to an abrupt halt when the whole come nearly collapsed amidst a financial crisis.
But, says Bolloré, “Jean-Marie was right in terms of the merger of content and the distribution network … everyone is doing that now”. Time and place then. Though detractors might note that all those big American media and entertainment giants that Vivendi aspires to sit alongside have always sought more synergies between their respective divisions – music, film, TV, media, games – but with limited success.
But Bolloré remains upbeat about the plan. “We have got Universal Music, we are getting into video games and we are investing in movies, series and shorts. The idea is to deliver the content through a galaxy of relationships with tel cos”.
Though, he adds, that doesn’t mean owning mobile networks like the Vivendi of old. “We are in telecoms but it is complementary to content. We don’t want to be an operator. We don’t want, industrially speaking, to manage a telecoms company. We manage content”.
So you heard the man, Universal artists, make sure your music is mobile friendly moving forward. Though, at the moment, Bolloré is more interested in the affairs of Vivendi’s loss-making TV firm Canal+ than its relatively successful music business.
But synergies between the group’s companies are clearly a priority for the top guard, and for Bolloré that means more than just the Vivendi companies. He is also the majority shareholder in Havas, an advertising and marketing group that already has a number of formal and informal alliances with Universal Music divisions.
Although once a part of Vivendi back in the day, Havas is now a totally separate company, except for having a shareholder in common in Bolloré. But that is enough to assure ever-closer relations in the future, says the chief, who now has his son Yannick – who heads up Havas – on the Vivendi board.
“It is clear something will happen” between the two businesses, says Bolloré to the FT. “What, when and how? Honestly, I can’t answer today. But you don’t need to be clever to make such a prediction. It’s logical”.
