After months of talks and convincing, French media giant Vivendi has agreed to sell its 20% share in NBC Universal to larger stake holder General Electronic in a deal which will cost the latter a whopping $5.8 Billion, taking the only hindrance in the way of the Comcast-GE joint venture away.

The development came after a major meeting between GE Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt and Vivendi's CEO Jean-Bernard Levy in Paris last week, and closed talks that had been going on for weeks on end.

Vivendi had originally valued the 20% NBCU stake at $6.1 Billion earlier this month, but GE declined the offer, and negotiations came right after that which narrowed the gap and helped the stake reach its current value. The NBC Universal share of 20% was acquired by Vivendi in 2004.

After the value was decided, there were reportedly disagreements in the way the payment would be made While Vivendi initially wanted the entire payment up-front, GE thought it would be better to pay after the deal with Comcast comes through. The final arrangement, thus reported, is that Vivendi would accept payment for about one-third of its stake at first, with complete payment coming in after the Comcast deal has been closed.

With the Vivendi-GE deal now through, GE holds 100% stake of NBC Universal. The position will now be utilized by the giant manufacturer of electronic gadgets to form a joint venture with Comcast, in what has been pegged as the year's biggest media deal.