Vivendi Buys 90% of Houghton Mifflin

Vivendi Universal, Europe’s biggest media company, said it owns about 90% of Houghton Mifflin Co. following its offer of $1.7 million in cash and assumed debt of $500,000 for the U.S. educational publisher. The French company said on June 1 it would offer $60 a share, and take on assumed debt from the Boston-based textbook publisher.

Buying Houghton, the publisher of the American Heritage Dictionary, will vault Vivendi to second-largest educational publisher from fifth, helping it compete with market leader Pearson.