Ubisoft has announced that it is buying back some 3.6 million shares from French investment bank, Banque Publique d’Investissement (Bpifrance).

The buy back comes at a cost of €33.80 per share and amounts to €122.5 million (~R1.8 billion) in total. While it may seem like a large amount to get back just 3.2% of its stock, Ubisoft is currently trying to fend off a hostile takeover from French media firm, Vivendi.

At time of writing, Vivendi already owns 20% of Ubi’s shares as well as Gameloft SE, a game company that was founded by the family of Ubisoft co-founder, Yves Guillemot.

This transaction with Bpifrance forms part of Ubisoft’s share buyback programme which concludes at the beginning of November.

That having been said it will be interesting to see how this purchase of shares sits with Vivendi when the two firms meet at the Ubisoft annual general meeting on 29th September to discuss board seats.

Why Ubisoft?

The acquisition of Ubisoft is something Vivendi says ” is part of a strategic vision of operational convergence between Vivendi’s content and platform and Ubisoft’s productions in the field of video games.”

However, Ubisoft chief financial officer, Alain Martinez told Bloomberg in July that shareholders aren’t convinced the acquisition is the best thing for Ubi.

“They’re not convinced by potential synergies or fruitful collaborations announced by Vivendi, and neither are we,” Martinez was quoted as saying. “They consider that if this strategy is properly executed, it should continue to create value.”

Should Ubisoft roll over and let Vivendi take over operations or would you prefer the Assassin’s Creed  developer to remain in control? Let us know in the comments below.

[Via – Venture Beat]