HMV has reached agreement for the £63m acquisition of the Ottakar's chain of 141 book stores. Ottakar's accepted HMV's offer of 285 pence per share, which valued Ottakar's at 62.9 million pounds. The revised bid was well below the 440 pence per share, which in August won HMV a bidding war for Ottakar's 140 stores across Britain. That offer expired when the Competition Commission began an investigation after independent book retailers voiced their opposition to the bid. The commission cleared the way for HMV to renew its advances earlier this month, and the lower bid came as surprise following deteriorating market conditions since the first offer. "Over the past year the book market has undergone a significant change with new levels of competition from the supermarkets and online retailers impacting all specialist booksellers and, in particular, those with insufficient scale to compete on equal terms," said Philip Dunne, chairman at Ottakar's.