Ubisoft evades hostile takeover by swapping Vivendi for Tencent

Ubisoft is announcing today that French multimedia conglomerate Vivendi is selling all of its shares in the game maker. This ends Vivendi’s bid to takeover Ubisoft.

As part of this agreement, Vivendi will get 2 billion Euros (approximately $2.45 billion). That money will come from a variety of existing and new investors in Ubisoft. The publisher itself is buying back stocks, Ubisoft chief executive Yves Guillemot’s own Guillemot Brothers SE business is also acquiring some of the stock from Vivendi. New investors include the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and Chinese multimedia internet conglomerate Tencent.