Back to square one. The judge-commissioner of the Commercial Court of Bobigny (Seine-Saint-Denis) officially launched, by an order dated Tuesday 1er February, a second call for tenders for the purchase of the 89% of shares held by the Bernard Tapie Group (GBT) in the capital of the newspaper Provence.
Previously, he had, in another order consulted by The world, closed the first tender procedure launched on October 26, 2021, and whose bids have still not been opened. In his decisions, the judge-commissioner invites the prospective buyers who came forward during this first call – the company Avenir Développement, a subsidiary of the NJJ holding company belonging to Xavier Niel (individual shareholder of the group The world), which already owns 11% of the newspaper, and the CMA CGM, of the shipowner Rodolphe Saadé – to go to the registry “to recover their folds”.
After the failure of this first sale procedure launched three months ago, the judge-commissioner seems determined not to waste any more time. New offers must be submitted before Monday, February 14, 12 noon. And a bid opening hearing will be held at the Bobigny Commercial Court the next day, Tuesday, February 15, at 2 p.m. A new set of specifications must be drawn up by the judicial liquidators in charge of the file. They are now two in number, after the appointment at the request of the Bobigny prosecution of Marc Sénéchal, in mid-January, alongside the first liquidator Xavier Brouard.
“A manifestly illicit disorder” at the liquidation
This umpteenth jolt in the sale of the Marseille press group, which also includes the newspaper Corse-Morning, broadcasting and advertising subsidiaries, for a total of nearly 850 employees, seems to be a response to a legal imbroglio. To circumvent the right of approval negotiated between Xavier Niel and Bernard Tapie, who died on October 3, 2021, which requires that the arrival of any new shareholder be validated unanimously by the five members of the board of directors of ProvenceMr. Brouard, then sole liquidator, brought the case before the Commercial Court of Marseille.
For him, the agreement between the two shareholders prevents free competition in the redemption of Mr. Tapie’s shares and gives too great an advantage to Mr. Niel. On January 11, the Marseille court ruled in his favor, finding that the clause constituted “manifestly unlawful disorder to liquidation and ordering its suspension. Although binding, this decision did not close this part of the file. At the request of the company Avenir Développement, an appeal hearing will be held in Aix-en-Provence (Bouches-du-Rhône), on March 28. And other procedures could follow, inevitably weakening the sales process.
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