Vivendi To Discuss Activision Blizzard Sale At Investors' Meeting

Written by: Jason Winter (@winterinformal) | June 8, 2012 2:00 pm

22 Comments

The parent company of Activision Blizzard, Vivendi SA, appears to be entertaining offers to purchase its majority share in the mega-publishers.

According to Bloomberg, an investor’s meeting will take place on June 22 in Corsica, in which Vivendi Chairman Jean-Rene Fourtou will discuss selling some portion of its 61% share in the companies.

Vivendi had a rough 2011, with its shares dropping 28%, even though Activision Blizzard went up by 4.5%.

What would a sale mean to players of World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, and other Activision Blizzard titles? What about upcoming titles like Titan or DOTA All-Stars?

When Vivendi merged with Activision and Blizzard in 2008, several games were dropped from development schedules, to be picked up by other publishers. The aforementioned titles would seem to be too “core” to Blizzard’s identity, but lesser titles in the Activision or Blizzard pipeline could be affected.

We’ll be watching this very closely and keeping you abreast of future developments.

Vivendi To Discuss Activision Blizzard Sale At Investors' Meeting

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Joel Marazzo

Imagine if EA bought them.
- http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1108105277 Kenneth Leo Hansen
  
  Well that will be a disaster.
  - http://www.facebook.com/people/Karl-Thysell/601969471 Karl Thysell
    
    sadly prob a chance
  - pandora005
    
    Time to get out those pitchforks and torches and finally march on EA headquarters?
- http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr
  
  Yep, EA would force them to release Titan this year, high box price, monthly sub separate from WoW and P2W cash shop.
downwardthumbs

Mi Gusta
downwardthumbs

Come on suits, let’s sink this ship.
William Holdn

….Zynga’s Warcraft
- http://www.facebook.com/mpdthompson Marcus Patrick Thompson
  
  BOOOOO that
http://www.facebook.com/BlkDragonPrince Ravin MacLeod

I wouldn’t be shocked to see blizzard buy itself back so it can kick activision off its name
- http://twitter.com/Luke_Malcolm Luke Malcolm
  
  *Fingers Crossed
- Kagitaar
  
  That is one of the real possibilities here, if they are dissatisfied with their partner, but I have a feeling their relationship is one of respect. We all hate Bobby Kotick, but he has no power over Blizzard, no matter what the popular ‘truth’ is.
DoctorOverlord

Mow some lawn LOL I also really liked the photoshopped auction house. You’re doing good Mike B, pound some more energy drinks!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Michael-Johnson/1353890372 Michael Johnson

EA could NEVER afford Activision.
Pull your head out.
Activision is worth 13 billion, far more than EA.

Sure EA could TRY to buy them and subsequently go bankrupt, but a more realistic possibility is Microsoft or Nexon. Shit, even Apple might jump at this chance to break into the video game market.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=506728308 Julian F’n Mugnieco

pretty sure vivendi isn’t selling their entire stake, only majority (61%), and it’s primarily due to the state of the French economy. Vivendi is in Paris.
- Kagitaar
  
  Vivendi is also a media giant, and media giants tend to shit their subsidiaries around when they get ansty, not a special event at all.
  - http://twitter.com/Luke_Malcolm Luke Malcolm
    
    Ya there just selling the stock, not the companies nothing to worry honestly
http://twitter.com/borded nathan law

if you wash cars for $1 you only need to wash $13 billion cars, get to it kids!
jayremy

Activision sees E3 games and all the new MMOs coming out in and outside of E3 showing, they all know money is going to be shifting in the gaming industry.
http://www.facebook.com/blackdogserenade Remington Hitchcock

Grandma paid me $20 a lawn, so you’d only have to mow 650,000,000 to get 13 billion. Sounds pretty easy to me. Of course, that includes weed eating and trimming.
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Richard-Goins/100000504590300 Richard Goins
  
  Well, you’re not taking into account the amount of time it would require to mow the lawns and the interest,
  
  So, if it takes you an two hours to mow a lawn and you put the money into a monthly compounding mutual fund returning an 8% APR:
  
  8 lawns per day * $20 = $160 / day
  $160 * 30 = $4800 / month
  
  $13 billion = $4800∑(1+.08/12)^-j, where j goes from 1 to n
  
  n = a complex number
  
  Therefore, you could never mow enough lawns to eventually earn this amount of money. It would grow much faster than you could keep up.
pandora005

8% of the US GNP is already owned by Saudi Arabia … go watch Fahrenheit 9/11.

Vivendi To Discuss Activision Blizzard Sale At Investors' Meeting

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