Vivendi has agreed to sell its French trade magazine operation to Cinven for £1.2 billion sterling.
Vivendi, Europe's largest media company, will secure a one-off gain of £503 million from the sale of the publishing unit. The Paris-based company says the offer values the company at double the unit's expected 2001 revenue.
The sell-off will fund its acquisition of Houghton Mifflin, but still leaves Vivendi still looking for a buyer for Comareg, a classified ads business.
Cinven, which last month sold UK publisher IPC for £1.11 billion in cash to AOL Time Warner, will take on a stable of mainly French-language publications.
The specialist titles include building, agriculture, technology and medical publications.
Vivendi's professional press business has annual sales of about £629 million.
According to the Financial Times, Vivendi also received an offer for the business from Anglo-Dutch publisher Reed Elsevier.
PA