Vivendi takes majority stake in Dailymotion

French media company Vivendi is buying 80 percent of the shares of the video sharing site Dailymotion for 217 million euros. The shares were held by the French telecom group Orange. Vivendi and Orange have been in talks since April this year.

In April, there was still talk of an amount of around 250 million euros for a large share package. With the purchase of Vivendi, the company gains access to music and video content owned by Universal Music and Canal+, which again fall under Vivendi. Orange will retain the remaining 20 percent of the shares. The 2005 Dailymotion is said to have received 351 million visitors via the desktop in May 2015, although those statistics are not easy to check.

Vivendi’s offer came a day after a bid from Hong Kong-based PCCW met too much opposition from the French government. Yahoo also tried to get hold of the site in 2013, but failed because the French minister for the digital economy thought that the technology, company, developers and jobs should remain in France.