A sign hangs outside the headquarters of Vivendi in Paris. The firm has made a $275.80mn offer for French online video group.
Reuters/Paris
Vivendi has made a €250mn ($275.80mn) offer for French online video group Dailymotion, owned by telecoms group Orange, Le Monde reported yesterday.
The Le Monde report followed a statement from Hong Kong conglomerate PCCW that it had ended talks to form an alliance with Dailymotion, citing the French government’s desire to see the video-sharing site remain in European hands.
“The French government’s preferred search for a European solution discourages international companies’ participation,” PCCW said in a statement explaining its decision.
Vivendi declined to comment and no one at Dailymotion was immediately available to comment.
Le Monde said Vivendi’s offer would be discussed at a board meeting today. “Vivendi’s ambition is to make Dailymotion a world size player,” Le Monde quoted an unidentified source as saying.
Orange has been looking for a partner for over a year to help Dailymotion expand internationally to try to compete with much larger rival Google’s YouTube.
The French government, Orange’s biggest shareholder with a 25% stake, said on Monday it was never hostile to the talks but had asked Dailymotion to not enter into exclusive discussions with PCCW before contacting all interested parties. “Orange pursues discussions and works towards submitting to the board in due time solutions that are being considered,” France’s economy ministry said.
Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron said last Thursday that Orange should look at all offers for Dailymotion as France was seeking to promote a strong European digital sector.
In 2013, Orange was in talks to sell all or part of the site to Yahoo but the French government scuppered the deal over concerns about a promising start-up getting snapped up by a US giant.
Dailymotion counts 128mn unique visitors per month compared with 1bn for Google’s YouTube, and achieves less than 100mn euros ($110mn) in annual sales.
Vivendi is currently facing pressure from US hedge fund P Schoenfeld Asset Management to increase the company’s planned payout to shareholders from a €35bn cash pile amassed from a series of disposals.
