How Air France-KLM proposed to take majority control of SAS
Air France-KLM completed a 19.9% investment in SAS in August 2024. Its July 2025 plan combined that stake with all shares held by Castlelake and Lind Invest, which would take it to 60.5%.
France · Competition
France’s competition authority reviewed 295 transactions in 2024. It says 97% were cleared without commitments and eight mergers were cleared subject to commitments.
Sources checked
295 · Transactions Source 1
97 · Percent Source 1
8 · Mergers Source 1
The reported share and the count answer different questions about the authority’s work.
Air France-KLM completed a 19.9% investment in SAS in August 2024. Its July 2025 plan combined that stake with all shares held by Castlelake and Lind Invest, which would take it to 60.5%.
France cleared Airbus’s purchase of selected Spirit AeroSystems assets in October 2025. The deal was part of a broader split in which Boeing bought Spirit subject to commitments accepted by the European Commission.
The European Commission cleared Alstom's acquisition of Bombardier Transportation in July 2020 subject to commitments. The transaction closed in 2021, followed by separate transfers affecting regional and very high-speed trains.
Ardian planned to raise its share of the pipeline operator SPMR from 47.2% to 52.2%. The French competition authority blocked the deal in 2021, and the Conseil d’État rejected the appeal in 2024.
France’s competition authority cleared Banijay Gaming’s proposed acquisition of JOA without conditions on 4 November 2026. The case put Betclic’s French online gambling activities alongside a business with 33 physical casinos.
France cleared Canal Plus’s acquisition of OCS and Orange Studio in January 2024 subject to five years of commitments. The company agreed to preserve a separate team that could offer to pre-buy French films for their first pay-TV window.
France's competition authority cleared CMA CGM's purchase of Altice Media in June 2024. It required a five-year package of commitments covering overlapping local television and newspaper advertising in Provence.
CMA CGM closed its €4.85 billion Bolloré Logistics purchase in February 2024 after conditional EU clearance. The European Commission later approved Balguerie to buy a divestment package covering activities in Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Martin and French Guiana.
CMA CGM’s 2019 accounts set 4 January as the acquisition date for CEVA. The later tender and market purchases took its share ownership to 99.56% by June, after a first investment near a quarter of the company in 2018.
France cleared Cristal Union’s acquisition of Lesaffre Frères in August 2025. The authority assessed sugar beet buying near the Nangis factory and industrial sugar supply across a market extending beyond France.
France became EDF's sole shareholder on 8 June 2023. The state first used a tender offer, then acquired the remaining covered shares and convertible bonds in a compulsory transfer.
The European Commission required retail divestments in Italy, the Netherlands and Belgium before clearing EssilorLuxottica's purchase of GrandVision in March 2021. The three packages covered 351 optical stores.
France’s competition authority cleared the co-operatives’ full merger in July 2026. The terms move assets or capacity to other operators at three points in the supply chain, from grain intake and feed to fattened duck production.
France’s competition authority cleared grocery deals involving more than 600 stores in 2025. In three deals it required commitments to preserve local competition, including store sales, a franchise termination and new space for competing retailers.
The French competition authority cleared GL events’ S-Pass acquisition with conditions in the Marne. Its decision identifies five venues, where the overlap depended on whether an organiser was booking a large show or a public fair.
LVMH announced an all-cash Tiffany acquisition in November 2019. After a closing dispute, the parties revised the price down $3.50 a share and eased closing conditions. Tiffany shareholders approved the amended deal in December 2020.
The European Commission cleared Orange and MásMóvil's Spanish joint venture in February 2024 subject to a 60 MHz spectrum transfer to Digi and an optional roaming agreement. Orange took full ownership of MasOrange in June 2026.
Renault put part of its Nissan stake in a trust in 2023 while keeping the economic rights. A later framework lowered the proposed minimum locked stakes and put Chennai manufacturing on a separate path to full Renault ownership.
Safran acquired Collins Aerospace’s flight-control and actuation activities on 21 July 2025. On the same day it sold its North American electromechanical actuation business to Woodward, addressing a competition concern about one component market.
CD&R acquired a controlling 50% stake in Opella on 30 April 2025. Sanofi retained 48.2% and Bpifrance took 1.8%. Sanofi's annual filing later reported €10.4 billion of net cash inflow and described how it accounted for its remaining investment.
Schneider Electric obtained 60% of enlarged AVEVA on a fully diluted basis in 2018, after combining their industrial software businesses. The 2023 acquisition used a court-sanctioned scheme to buy the publicly held remainder.
Bouygues withdrew its proposed takeover of the M6 group in September 2022 after a French in-depth review. The authority identified concerns about television advertising and TV service distribution.
Ubisoft's November 2025 closing disclosure says Tencent subscribed for 26.32% of Vantage Studios' capital and votes. The subsidiary groups teams working on three franchises, and its shareholder agreement assigns separate protections to the two investors.
Veolia first bought 29.9% of Suez and took control after a tender offer. Less than two weeks after the initial tender settled, Veolia sold a package of French water, waste and other assets to a consortium that continued to operate under the Suez name.
France cleared Vossloh’s takeover of Sateba in September 2025 after the buyer agreed to keep supplying concrete supports to competing turnout suppliers. The pledge lasts five years and can be renewed once.
Worldline completed its Ingenico acquisition in October 2020. European competition commitments led it to sell parts of the physical point-of-sale acquiring businesses in Austria, Belgium and Luxembourg to two buyers in 2021.
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