Vivendi accepts €17bn Numericable bid for SFR mobile unit

Vivendi said Saturday it had accepted a bid by French cable and fibre-optic network operator Numericable to buy its SFR mobile phone unit over a rivaloffer from French telecoms company Bouyges."The supervisory board has unanimously decided to accept the Altice/Numericablebid," the group said in a statement, saying it was the more likely to favour "growth(and) create value for customers, employees and shareholders".The total value of the deal is more than 17 billion euros ($23.3 billion), the companysaid in a statement."All the experts consulted concluded that the Altice/Numericable offer presents theleast risk in terms of competition. SFR and Numericable are not in the same segments of the market and their activities are complementary," Vivendi said.