News Corp drops BSkyB bid
Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation has withdrawn its BSkyB takeover bid following pressure from all sides including the British PM.
- Published by David Knox
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- Filed under News
Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation has withdrawn its BSkyB takeover bid as an independent inquiry into phone hacking is announced.
The media company has been under attack after it emerged that the phone of an abducted 13-year-old girl had been hacked by News of the World journalists, and messages deleted.
The back-out for the satellite broadcaster also follows Prime Minister David Cameron calling for News Corporation to drop its takeover plans.
News Corporation, which owns the Sun and the Times as well as a 39% shareholding in BSkyB, said it had become clear it was “too difficult” to proceed with the takeover bid in the current climate.
A Downing Street spokesman said: “We welcome the news. As the Prime Minister has said, the business should focus on clearing up the mess and getting its own house in order.”
BSkyB shares fell another 1%, to 683.5p, having been 850p earlier this month on hopes of a deal with News Corp.
Rupert Murdoch is reported to be weighing a sale of News Corporation’s remaining British newspapers.
Source: The Independent
8 Responses
My bad. News’ 43% holding is in Sky Network Television Limited: .investsmart.com.au/shares/asx/Sky-Network-Television-SKT.asp
Lucio, I don’t mean to nit-pick, but BSkyB actually owns 33% of Sky News Aus, where News Corp only owns 39% of BSkyB itself. That said, the Australia Network contract should never have been put out to tender in the first place.
@lucio
News Corp has a 39% stake in BSkyB which has a one-third stake in Sky Australia’s parent company Australian News Channels
My quick research today indicates News Ltd with a 43.65% shareholding in SKY Network here in Australia. I wonder how the current events may play out with respect to the Australia Network tender?
Avaaz.org did a worldwide action alert against the takeover also. It is nice to see results like this. Now if we could only do it here…..
The bigger they are, the harder they shall fall!
Media Watch had this as the topic Monday, the video can be watch or downloaded from their site.
abc.net.au/mediawatch/
And so they should.
It would be wise to stop the widespread spending. With it’s highest selling Newspaper no longer operating, the reputation of it’s ‘News’ ethics hitting the floor as well as other failed business ventures such as Myspace it’s hard to imagine a company that just keeps wanting more more more.