Brussels, 24/07/2003 (Agence Europe) - The Commission has decided to carry out itself the inquiry into the planned acquisition of Vivendi Universal Publishing (VUP) by Lagardère itself and has subsequently rejected the French competition authorities request to deal with the matter. On 14 May 2003, the French authorities lodged an application asking that the case be referred to them as the transaction essentially affected French markets forming part of the "book chain" (markets in the acquisition of authors' rights, publishing and distribution). Publishers such as Gallimard and Seuil, as well as small Belgian and French booksellers feared French sympathy for a merger and urged the Commission to refuse such a request, as the repercussions of such an operation (according to them) would stretch across the whole French speaking publishing market. The Commission has concluded that most of them are of supranational geographical dimension, covering the whole of the French-speaking area in Europe. However, as far as the particular case of the markets for the sale of school books and other text books is concerned, the Commission has found that the first of these two markets does indeed constitute a separate national market; however, the Commission did not feel able, at this stage, to decide on the geographical dimension of the second of the two markets. At all events, given the substantial overlap between these two markets and all the other activities forming part of the book chain, the Commission took the view that a single authority should examine the impact of the transaction on the relevant markets as a whole. The Commission will now pursue its detailed investigation, in accordance with its decision of 5 June 2003, which established that there were serious doubts as to the competitive impact of the transaction on a number of markets affected by it. It is expected to reach a decision by 3 December at the latest.