Shareholders of Cossette Inc. meeting in Quebec City on Friday voted to approve a friendly takeover bid by the U.S.-based private equity firm Mill Road Capital L.P.

The deal means Mill Road will privatize the Quebec advertising company, after 10 years as a publicly traded company.

Cossette 3-month chart

Mill Road is paying $8.10 per share for Cossette in a deal that values the company at about $135.4 million.

Senior executives, including CEO Claude Lessard, said they eventually will step aside once the sale is complete to make way for a younger management team, said Marcel Barthe, vice-president of corporate strategy.

"In our business of communication," he said, "it needs innovation, it needs new trends," Barthe said in an interview after the meeting.

Cossette shareholders voted 99.9 per cent in favour of the bid. The deal to privatize Cossette is expected to close on Tuesday.

Cossette was known for its ad campaign with talking beavers Frank and Gordon for Bell Canada during the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. The furry creatures were retired last year by Bell.

The firm has more than 1,400 employees with offices across Canada and around the world with customers including General Mills of Canada, Bell, Coca-Cola Ltd., Hydro-Québec and Sony Ericsson and Virgin Travel and Virgin Trains.

With files from The Canadian Press