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NEW DELHI -- Indian businessmen are taking unprecedented measures to express their frustration with the Congress-led government and its Communist allies. The chairman of the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Vodafone has moved a step closer to taking control of SFR, France's second-largest mobile operator, after it reached an agreement with Vivendi Universal to simplify the [...]

PARIS and NEW YORK -- A US court yesterday upheld the controversial Euros 20.6m (Dollars 23.3m) golden parachute given to Jean-Marie Messier, former Vivendi Universal chief executive. The ruling comes [...]

PARIS and NEW YORK -- France's stock market regulator has given information gathered during a 15-month probe into Jean-Marie Messier's leadership of Vivendi Universal to the public prosecutor, the Commission [...]

PARIS and NEW YORK -- Vivendi Universal last night risked seeing Edgar Bronfman Jr walk out of the bidding for its US entertainment assets after it refused to offer either [...]

LONDON and NEW YORK -- NBC, the broadcasting arm of General Electric, has warned Vivendi Universal that the French group's price expectations for its US entertainment assets are unrealistic. NBC [...]

Jean-Marie Messier was yesterday at the centre of an unprecedented transatlantic legal battle with Vivendi Universal after French and American jurisdictions clashed over the ousted chief executive's right to a [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Edgar Bronfman Jr, former chief executive of Seagram, is joining the bidding for US music and movie assets valued at Euros 15bn-Euros 16bn (Dollars 17.5bn-Dollars 18.6bn) [...]

PARIS and SAN FRANCISCO -- Steve Jobs, Apple Computer's chief executive, said his company had never made any offer to invest in or acquire Vivendi's Universal music division. But he [...]

PARIS -- USA Interactive has become the latest media group to file a lawsuit against Vivendi Universal in a move that could hold up the French media group's planned sale [...]

PARIS -- Vivendi Universal paid Jean-Marie Messier Euros 5.6m (Pounds 3.9m) in 2002 - 10 per cent more than in 2001 - even though he was ousted from his position [...]

PARIS and NEW YORK -- Senior executives at Vivendi Universal yesterday expressed 'astonishment and disgust' at the decision by Liberty Media to join the long list of investors taking legal [...]

BUDAPEST and PARIS -- Vivendi Universal is set to sell its Hungarian telecommunications operations to AIG Global Investment, the private equity arm of US insurer AIG, and GMT Communications Partners, [...]

When it comes to white collar investigations, the wheels of French justice have a reputation for grinding extremely slowly. The Credit Lyonnais affair, rumbling on a decade after the bank's [...]

PARIS -- Fifteen police officers from the Paris fraud squad yesterday raided the headquarters of Vivendi Universal and two properties belonging to Jean- Marie Messier, its ousted chief executive. The [...]

PARIS -- Vivendi Universal will demerge its US entertainment assets under the Universal brand next year either through a stock market listing or an outright sale, executives at the French [...]

PARIS -- Vivendi Universal yesterday gave its clearest signal yet that it would consider selling its US film and music arms, both of which suffered severe falls in profitability during [...]

LONDON and PARIS -- Vivendi Universal is poised to accept a sharply-reduced takeover bid for Telepiu`, its Italian pay-TV arm, as part of its long-awaited debt restructuring. It is understood [...]

PARIS -- Jean-Marie Messier refused yesterday to resign as a director of Vivendi Environnement, in a highly confrontational move that threatens to stymie the board's attempts to sever ties with [...]

PARIS -- The French stock market regulator has seized e-mails sent between Jean-Marie Messier, ousted chief executive of Vivendi Universal, and the media group's auditors related to its off-balance-sheet activities. [...]

The lengthening list of assets for sale at Vivendi Universal reflects the severity of the financial crisis bequeathed by ousted chief executive Jean-Marie Messier. Now that the banks have decided [...]

PARIS -- Shares in Vivendi Universal fell 25 per cent to 15-year lows yesterday after Standard & Poor's, the rating agency, downgraded the group's debt to junk status and Moody's [...]

PARIS -- Vivendi Universal shares fell 13 per cent yesterday after Jean-Rene Fourtou, the new chief executive, said the cash-strapped French media group needed to make 'significant asset disposals' and [...]

PARIS -- Canal Plus, the pay-television subsidiary of Vivendi Universal, is to be broken up and its international operations sold in a move that will 'considerably' cut the media group's [...]

PARIS -- Executives gathered at Vivendi Universal's Paris headquarters yesterday to thrash out an agreement on an asset disposal strategy, as talks dragged on with various banks over the terms [...]

PARIS -- Executives gathered at Vivendi Universal's Paris headquarters yesterday to thrash out an agreement on an asset disposal strategy, as talks dragged on with various banks over the terms [...]

PARIS -- US investors have filed a securities fraud lawsuit against media giant Vivendi Universal and its former chairman, Jean-Marie Messier, that alleges the ousted chief executive inflated the value [...]

PARIS -- Guillaume Hannezo, finance director of Vivendi Universal and loyal lieutenant of ousted chief executive Jean-Marie Messier, is expected to quit the French media group as soon as a [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Vivendi Universal yesterday set to work on an immediate financial rescue package, as the French media group revealed that it faced Euros 1.8bn (Pounds 1.16bn) in [...]

PARIS -- Claude Bebear, honorary chairman of Axa and now the power behind the throne at Vivendi Universal, is a dangerous man if you're an underperforming French chief executive. Not [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Vivendi Universal yesterday set to work on an immediate financial rescue package, as the French media group revealed that it faced Euros 1.8bn in debts falling [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Jean-Rene Fourtou last night took the helm at Vivendi Universal as the value of the French media group plummeted amid fears of a crippling debt burden [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Jean-Rene Fourtou last night took the helm at Vivendi Universal as the value of the French media group plummeted amid fears of a crippling debt burden [...]

There is no respite for Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal. Shares in the indebted French media group yesterday fell more than 23 per cent to levels last seen [...]

PARIS -- Vivendi Universal is facing a legal challenge from French minority shareholders seeking an independent review of Jean-Marie Messier's supply of information to the French media group's board. The [...]

PARIS -- Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, picked up a bonus worth 250 per cent of his salary last year, even though the media and communications group turned [...]

PARIS -- Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, yesterday made a spirited appeal to 5,000 of his shareholders to trust his continued stewardship of the debt-laden media group. Shareholders [...]

Shares in Vivendi Universal fell 4 per cent at one point yesterday to their lowest level since October 1997, after an unexpectedly large goodwill write-off pushed the French media group [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, is contemplating a purge of the French media group's cash-burning internet activities that could lead to it abandoning the [...]

PARIS -- Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, made a spirited appeal yesterday to 5,000 of his shareholders to trust his continued stewardship of the debt-laden media group. Shareholders [...]

Jean-Marie Messier is expected to claim board support at Vivendi Universal's annual meeting this afternoon, damping speculation that the chief executive would be brought down by the media group's record [...]

PARIS -- Jean-Marie Messier, the embattled chief executive of Vivendi Universal, came under mounting pressure in Paris during the weekend as opponents planned mass protests at the media group's shareholder [...]

The last nine days have provided the low-point of Jean-Marie Messier's career as chief executive at Vivendi Universal. It all started last Friday in New York, when he read a [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- France's foremost corporate raider, Vincent Bollore, has started to build a stake in Vivendi Universal amid continuing attacks on Jean-Marie Messier from French politicians and angry [...]

One of the traditional ways for French governments to bring troublesome chief executives to heel used to be to send in the tax auditors. For months on end the government's [...]

Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, yesterday came under fire from the French establishment and thousands of employees for sacking Pierre Lescure as chairman of Canal Plus, the pay-TV [...]

The three men who met last month at Chez Miocque, a popular brasserie in Deauville, had asked for the surrounding tables to be cleared of guests. They did not want [...]

The moment long feared by the French political and cultural establishment has arrived. Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, yesterday moved to stamp his authority on Canal Plus, one [...]

PARIS and LONDON -- Jean-Marie Messier, chief executive of Vivendi Universal, has abandoned a planned holiday in the Bahamas to deal with the management crisis engulfing the French media group. [...]

On January 30 2000 Sir Christopher Gent and Jean-Marie Messier looked unassailable as the kings of the new economy in Europe. The two wallowed in publicity as Vodafone, the UK [...]