1822 – Foundation of the “Papeteries Bolloré”, near Quimper on the Odet bank.

1917 – purchase of Mill Cascadec and plant construction.

1918 – creation of the brand OCB : Odet-Cascadec- Bolloré.

1981 – Vincent Bolloré takes over the family company.

1985 – stock market listing Bolloré Technologies.

1986 – takeover of the SCAC.

1988 – takeover of Bolloré in Rivaud Group. Takeover of SCAC on Rhin-Rhône.

1989 – takeover of Rhin-Rhône in Calpam.

1990 – fuel activities of SCAC and Rhin-Rhône merging to create Bolloré Energie.

1991 – takeover of Delmas-Vieljeux. Merger with the SCAC and creation of SDV (SCAC- Delmas Vieljeux).

1992 – creation of Coralma, tobacco subsidiary 60% owns by Bolloré and 40% by SEITA.

1996 – takeover of the Rivaud Group.

1997 – takeover of Saga.

1999 – Bolloré buys the African network AMI and Bolloré Investissement purchases the British shipping line OTAL and its land transport network in Africa.

2000 – granting of the concession for the third largest oil pipeline in France, the Donges-Melun-Metz (DMM) pipeline. Sale of the cigarette paper business to the American Group Republic Technologies. Acquisition of Seita’s 40% stake in Coralma, a tobacco subsidiary of the Group, 60% of which was already owned through Tobaccor.

2001 – sale of 75% of the tobacco business (Tobaccor), based in Africa and Asia, to the British group Imperial Tobacco. Takeover by Bolloré Energie of a share in the business of BP’s fuel distribution subsidiary in France. Acquisition by Delmas, Bolloré’s shipping subsidiary, of 80% of the Italian firm Linea-Setramar.

2002 – acquisition by IER of the specialist access control firm Automatic Systems. Acquisition by SDV of the freight forwarding business of the German group Geis, with an important transport network in Asia.

2003 – sale of the remaining interest in Tobaccor. The Group’s holding in Vallourec rises above the 20 % threshold (voting stock)..

2004 – sale of the Malaysian plantations. Acquisition of a 20% stake in Havas. Development of the Buecar, a prototype electric vehicle that runs solely on Batscap batteries.

2005 – launch of Direct 8, the digital terrestrial television (DTT) station developed by the Group. Acquisition of Air Link, India’s third largest freight operator. Acquisition of a 25% stake in Aegis. Sale of 7.5% of Vallourec capital stock.

2006 – sale of the shipping business (Delmas). Purchase of 12 regional WiMax licences. Sale of 10.2% of holding in Vallourec.

2007 – acquisition of JE-Bernard, one of the leading logistics and freight forwarding groups in Britain, and Pro-service, an American logistics company specialising in the aeronautics and space industry. Acquisition of assets in Avestor in the electric battery in Canada. Launch of the free daily newspaper, Direct Matin Plus. Sale of 3.5% of equity share in Vallourec and strengthened position in Havas and Aegis.

2008 – sale of 3.6% of Vallourec. Creation of two joint ventures for the development of electric vehicles (Pininfarina for the Bluecar and Gruau for the Microbus). Acquisition of eight further Wimax licences obtained. Acquisition of White Horse, a leading road haulage firm in the Copper Belt corridor, and SAEL, the fifth largest freight chartering firm in South Africa. Takeover of CSA Group.

2009 – winning of the concession for the Cotonou container terminal in Benin and start of operations at the Pointe-Noire port terminal in Congo. Sale of the Papers business to the American group Republic Technologies international. Strengthening of holding in Vallourec to 5.2% as of December 31, 2009.

2010 – obtaining of port concessions in Africa (Freetown in Sierra Leone, Lomé in Togo…). Acquisition of the digital terrestrial TV station Virgin 17, renamed Direct Star. Winning of the Autolib’ contract.

2011 – acquisition of 49%-equity share in LCN (Les Combustibles de Normandie). Beginning of construction of a new lithuim metal polymer (LMP®) battery factory in Brittany. Sale of 3.5% of holding in Vallourec. Agreement to sell the free channels Direct 8 and Direct Star to the Canal + group in exchange for remuneration in Vivendi shares. Acquisition of 1.1% of Vivendi. Launch of Autolib’ service in Paris and in 45 cities around Paris.

2012 – sale of Direct 8 and Direct Star’s channels to the Canal + group, against a share of 1.7% of Vivendi’s capital. The Group share in Vivendi is carried in 5% on October 10. Sale of 20% from Aegis at Dentsu, the balance of shares (6.4%) will be given to the offer launche by Dentsu. Following the share buyback offer issued by Havas, the Bolloré Group’s stake increased from 32.8% to 37.05% in Havas.

2013 – winning of the management of the pretroleum port of Pemba in Mozambique, the second container terminal of Abidjan, Republic of Côte d’Ivoire and the Dakar RoRo terminal in Senegal, Oil logistics division’s acquisition of PMF-Petroplus Marketing France. Delisting of Plantations des Terres Rouges of which the Bolloré Group now holds 100%. Initial public offering (ipo) of Blue Solutions on the NYSE Euronext Paris market on October 30, 2013. Launch of Bluely car-sharing services (Lyon-Villeurbanne) and Bluecub (Bordeaux). Disposal of the remaining 6.4% held in Aegis, at the beginning of 2013.

2014 – sale of SAFA, which owned a plantation in Cameroon (SAFACAM), for a 9% interest in Socfinaf. Public exchange offer on Havas shares. Disposal in July 2014 of 16% of the Euro Media Group. Disposal of the 14% interest in Harris Interactive, as part of an offer made by Nielsen in February 2014. Inauguration of the Bluetram plant in Brittany. Experimental car-sharing system in Indianapolis (United States), Blueindy. Bids won in London to manage the RATP network of 1,400 charging terminals for 6-meter and 12-meter buses.

2015 – rise of the shareholding in Vivendi’s share capital to 14.4%. Successful public share exchange offer on Havas bringing ownership up to 82.5%, followed by a placement of 22.5 % to maintain liquidity in the shares, bringing ownership down to 60% of share capital. Obtaining of port concessions in Kribi (Cameroon), Dili (East Timor) and Varreux (Haïti). Launch of the Blueindy electric car-sharing service in Indianapolis (United States). Inauguration of the new Bluetram plant. Presentation of the 12-meter long electric bus. Partnership with PSA Peugeot Citroën to develop and sell the E-Mehari.

2016 – launch of the electric car-sharing service in Turin, Italy, on March 18, 2016.

2017 – 195th anniversary of the Bolloré Group. Here, the 195th anniversary video.
Full consolidation of Vivendi from April 26, 2017. Acquisition by Vivendi of the Bolloré Group’s 59.2% holding in Havas, followed by a simplified takeover bid on the rest of the Havas share capital, a public repurchase offer and squeeze-out, enabling Vivendi to hold 100% of the Havas capital. Finalization of the Bolloré simplified takeover of Blue Solutions, with the acquisition of 7.6% of the Blue Solutions capital. Disposal of the holding of around 10% in Gaumont as part of the share repurchase offer. Acquisition of the concession for the new Kribi container terminal in Cameroon. Partial takeover of Necotrans assets. Inauguration of the new multipurpose terminal in Owendo, Gabon, where the Bolloré Group will be the exclusive operator of the Container activity.

2018 – increase in the share capital of Vivendi, through the exercise of options and new acquisitions of shares, bringing the stake to 26.28% of the capital and 28.51% of the voting rights at December 31, 2018. Sale by Vivendi of the 27.3% stake in Ubisoft for 2 billion euros. Sale by Vivendi of the 11% stake in Fnac-Darty for 267 million euros. End of the Autolib’ car-sharing service in Paris. Launch of an electric car-sharing service, BlueLA, in Los Angeles.

2019 – sale of the port activities in France to Groupe Maritime Kuhn. Inauguration of a new 50,000 m2 BlueHub logistics platform in Singapore. Sale by Bolloré Energy of its 5.5% stake in the pipeline transport company Trapil. Acquisition by Vivendi of 100% of the share capital of Editis. Acquisition by Tencent Holdings Ltd and international financial investors of 10% of the share capital of UMG.

2020 – Acquisition of a 29.2% stake in Lagardère.

2021 – Sale of an additional 10% of UMG’s share capital to a consortium led by Tencent and 10% to the Pershing Square Group, followed by the distribution of 60 % of the share capital of its subsidiary (UMG) to its shareholders, and the listing of UMG on the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange. Bolloré holds an 18% stake in UMG and Vivendi retains a holdings of 10%. Vivendi acquired Amber Capital’s shares in Lagardère, bringing its stake to 45.1% of share capital.

2022 – On February 17, the Bolloré Group celebrated its 200th anniversary. You can discover the site dedicated to the history of the Group by clicking on this link.
Launch of the public tender offer to buy Lagardère. Signing of the agreement for the sale of Bolloré Africa Logistics to MSC. Acquisition by Vivendi of 8.8% of the share capital of Progressif Media, a digital communications company.

2023 – Creation of an ad hoc committee and appointment of an independent expert for a proposed simplified public tender offer by Bolloré SE on its own shares.