Vivendi Awaits Its Chairman’s Next Move
Bolloré could start remaking French media group within months; in reserve: $11 billion
PARIS— Vivendi SA ’s chairman and single-largest shareholder, Vincent Bolloré, is sitting on a multibillion-dollar reserve that continues to swell from asset sales. Now a big question is swirling: What will he do with the company’s cash?
Mr. Bolloré, who is known as one of France’s savviest but most unpredictable businessmen, is the crucial player in defining the further evolution of Vivendi, a once-sprawling conglomerate that in recent years slimmed down to two media businesses: California-based Universal Music Group and French pay-television provider Canal Plus Group.
Last week, Mr. Bolloré’s family business raised its stake in Vivendi to 8.2% from 5.2%, tightening the billionaire’s grip on the company he has gradually taken hold of since entering with a small stake a little more than two years ago.
Faced with the challenge of reviving growth, Vivendi has sold off assets that accounted for more than half of its revenue, including videogames maker Activision Blizzard and telecommunications companies in France and Morocco, moving toward a much smaller and more media-centric version of its former disparate self. Since Mr. Bolloré became chairman last June, Vivendi has continued to slim down, amassing a cash pile that will soon total roughly €10 billion ($11 billion) after the company returns money to shareholders.
A person close to the company said Vivendi will likely wait until it has closed all asset sales before it begins the company’s reconstruction, around this summer.
“There is probably only one man who knows what the future of Vivendi looks like and that’s him,” said another person close to Vivendi. “I can’t read him, but I am convinced he has a very clear idea of where he is going.”
Mr. Bolloré, who declined to comment for this article, has given few hints about Vivendi’s future.
Last June, he pledged to create closer cooperation between Vivendi’s units that do very different things to create an “industrial integrated content group.” He has pointed to Africa as one area of such closer ties, a continent where Mr. Bolloré could leverage his vast experience. His family business Groupe Bolloré controls logistics networks in nearly 50 African countries.
While such closer ties could create interesting opportunities—a first example was the co-production of an African TV talent-scout show—many analysts question how this can become a significant source of revenue.
Mr. Bolloré has also said he wants Vivendi to become a French version of German media group Bertelsmann SE by bringing together all sorts of media in French-speaking countries, sparking more speculation about what Vivendi might buy.
The lack of clarity about Vivendi’s future has frustrated some investors, especially last week as some of them struggled to understand why Vivendi decided to sell its minority stake in French telecom group Numericable-SFR SA at a price many deemed too low.
“There is a sense that Vivendi is now being run in a less transparent way, with one investor making decisions based on information which we don’t have,” said Claudio Aspesi, senior media researcher at Bernstein Research. “Mr. Bolloré’s track record in media investments is excellent. But right now, no one knows how he will be successful and over what period of time.”
Chief Executive Arnaud de Puyfontaine last month called on investors to be patient, quipping that “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” He said acquisitions were possible, but only under “strict financial discipline.”
In more than three decades of investing in prominent French companies, Mr. Bolloré has made a fortune by seizing control of often poorly run businesses, sometimes in a quick raid, sometimes in a long slow immersion.
“People say he is a corporate raider but I don’t think that’s true. He is a very clever, long-term business builder,” said Martin Sorrell, chief executive of U.K advertising company WPP PLC, a rival to France-based Havas SA, which Mr. Bolloré controls.
Some of Mr. Bolloré’s early moves at Vivendi bear resemblance to how he shook up Havas, his first major venture into the media world.
In 2004, he bought a small stake in Havas, the beginning of a journey that led to him taking control of about 82% earlier this year through a share-swap deal. Mr. Bolloré quickly built up his stake, challenged the company’s strategy and soon after became chairman.
Once in control, Mr. Bolloré overhauled the business. He pulled a plug on acquisitions and cut costs to pay down debt, set precise goals and targets, oversaw almost all financial-committee meetings and charmed companies to win new clients, recalls Mr. Rodés.
“It took him only a few months to learn the workings of advertising. Then, he picked up the phone and called every single client, big or small,” he said. Mr. Rodés’s family owns a small stake in Groupe Bolloré.
Havas clawed its way back to growth, with its share price roughly doubling since 2004. In 2013, Mr. Bolloré handed the chairmanship to his son Yannick to focus on his next project: Vivendi.
It took Mr. Bolloré less than two years to effectively control Vivendi with a 5% stake. He bought his entry ticket on friendly grounds in 2012 by exchanging his TV operations for Vivendi stock. He obtained a board seat and started maneuvers from the sideline that led to a boardroom clash with then-Chairman Jean-René Fourtou over who should run the company, according to people familiar with the situation. The two men quickly settled their dispute and Mr. Fourtou handed over the chairmanship to Mr. Bolloré last summer.
Mr. Bolloré today spends most of his time on Vivendi, where he is involved in all parts of the business, according to people familiar with the matter.
At Canal Plus, he has set up monthly meetings to review the latest results and projects, a step up from quarterly meetings before his tenure, some people said. Mr. Bolloré since 2012 has also regularly flown to Los Angeles to meet with Universal Music group executives, including CEO Lucian Grainge and nearly all the heads of the group’s individual record labels, other people said. Mr. Grainge’s team has received “very firm indications” from Mr. Bolloré that he has no desire to sell the record company, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Mr. Bolloré has also brought in several allies, including cinema producer Tarak Ben Ammar and senior Havas executive Dominique Delport, who were named to the board last month.
People who have done business with Mr. Bolloré describe him as charming and shrewd, disciplined and controlling. They say he has a great talent for quickly seizing people’s psychology, knows how to surround himself with those who won’t challenge his decisions too much and trusts only a handful of confidants.
“Mr. Bolloré is known for taking everyone by surprise, so I don’t know it makes much sense trying to guess his next move,” said Charles Bedouelle, an analyst at BNP Paribas . “But the more he owns the better, as he will be more likely to create real money.”
Mr. Rodés is convinced that waiting for further changes can pay off. “He is a man of mystery, but also a winning Roman warrior.”