Ubisoft may receive govt backing in defense against Electronic Arts (thanks Voodoo Extreme) outlines possible plans for the French government to intervene to prevent Electronic Arts from acquiring more of Ubisoft beyond their recent purchase of just under 20% of the French games publisher. Concerned with the viability of French game developers, some 20 of which have deals with Ubi, the story reports the company "could receive government support in its fight against the threat of a takeover by US video games giant Electronic Arts, La Tribune newspaper reported without naming its sources." The reports also says that in light of the lack of communication from EA on the topic, EA's recent acquisition of 19.9% of Ubisoft is "unsolicited and currently considered as hostile." The story also speculates that the Guillemot family may increase its interest in Ubi to stave off further advances. On a related note, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot speaks his mind on the EA deal on GameSpot (thanks Frans) discusses all this:

When looking at the longer-term, our only concern is the risk that we may not be allowed to fully realize our vocation of being creators of high quality games. Our goal is to create the best games available, and our teams are motivated and love what they do because they see that this is the key to their success. Our philosophy has been to change the terms of success in this industry, so that a successful game is one that is innovative and creative.