Brussels, 05/12/2003 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission is preparing to give a conditional go-ahead to the acquisition of Editis by Lagardère. On Wednesday, the French group agreed to final concessions in order to gain the European executive's approval. The Lagardère group announced that would sell off 60% of Editis activities in terms of turnover (or EUR 560 million in turnover proposed at sale), preferring to reduce its ambitions rather than face a refusal. Thus the acquisition will see the sale of the Spanish publisher Anaya, Larousse, as well as certain activities of Armand Colin, Dunos and Dalloz. As the transaction presented serious problems in the distribution sector, Lagardère also agreed to sell the Malesherbes distribution centre, at the heart of the problem. 'Following the announcement made this morning by the Lagardère group to review its planned merger with Editis and to only retain a certain number of publishing houses in France, as well as Anaya in Spain, Commissioner Monti intends to submit to the Commission in the coming weeks a draft decision authorising the reformulated transaction,' underlined spokesperson Amelia Torres, on Wednesday. (unofficial translation)
The European Consumers Organisation (BEUC) and French publishing professionals, who strongly opposed the project, are also satisfied with these proposals. 'The BEUC and the CLCV welcome the decision announced by Lagardère to only retain certain publishers. We welcome the action by DG Competition, which allowed for this consumer friendly development,' announced a BEUC press release (unofficial translation). The European Commission will officially take this decision on 13 January.