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Universal Music owner trying to get back into gaming
By Chris Cooke | Published on Tuesday 1 March 2016
Universal Music owner Vivendi is keen to get back into the gaming business it seems, it having once been the biggest shareholder in games giant Activision.
Vivendi has been in an acquisitions mode of late having raised a bucket of cash by selling off most of its gaming and tel co interests. A bucket of cash it now seems to be using to increase its interests in, erm, gaming and telecommunications.
Now the largest shareholder in Telecom Italia, Vivendi has been trying to buy French gaming firm Gameloft. Yesterday the entertainment conglom increased its offer for the gaming company after the Gameloft board said its previous bid was too low. Vivendi was originally offering €6 per Gameloft share, and has now increased that to €7.20.
Although Vivendi has said that it wants to become a player across the entertainment industry – it already operating in music, TV and ticketing – Gameloft’s board, as well knocking back its potential suitor’s initial bid price, also said that Vivendi “does not have a single business that could offer Gameloft synergies”.
Elsewhere in Vivendi news, the firm last week settled a long-running lawsuit with US-based Liberty Media over a deal way back in 2001, when the former bought the latter’s stake in USA Networks. Liberty successfully sued claiming that it had been misled about the value of the Vivendi shares that were part of the deal. Although finally settling the litigation, Vivendi said that the deal was not an “admission of any wrongdoing”.
