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Bolloré-owned Vivendi interested in acquiring Lagardère

A spokesman for Vivendi said the French conglomerate's interest in acquiring Le Journal du Dimanche and Paris Match owner Lagardère is about strengthening the business rather than gaining political influence.

Bolloré-owned Vivendi interested in acquiring Lagardère

The comments were made as billionaire controller Vincent Bolloré steps up his involvement in the country's politics via his group's print assets and fast-growing news channel CNews.

CNews has become increasingly popular in the lead-up to the April presidential election to the point where it is now France’s second most popular 24-hour news channel.

Its success has caused commentators to compare Bolloré with the media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who is seen to have great political influence in the Anglosphere.

Speaking to The Telegraph, Francois Godard of Enders Analysis said: “When Rupert Murdoch stormed the UK press, he wanted to modernise the media industry.”

“He wanted to break the trade unions because those trade unions were the roadblock on the road to modernisation of the UK press.

“I don’t know what Bollore’s vision is: what is the plan and where are we going? If Zemmour was elected as president of the republic then he could thank Bollore for it. Zemmour is a very good entertainer and Bollore had the intelligence to give him airtime.

“But the weight of CNews in French politics is nothing like the weight of the Sun in British politics at the time of Tony Blair.

“The intelligence of Murdoch was that he aligned with Blair and it gave him leverage. The problem with CNews is that it gives Bollore leverage within the right, but outside of the right - and by that I mean the government and the left - he loses leverage, because he is stuck to the right wing.”

A spokesperson for Vivendi told The Telegraph: “When we launched CNews, Mr Bollore said very few media groups are positioned on the right and there is a real niche to take there.”

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