Comcast is "ready to go to war" with Walt Disney, according to Brice & Smith of BLOOMBERG. The cable company said that it "may make an offer for a wide swath of 21st Century Fox Inc.’s entertainment assets," a business that Disney has already agreed to buy for roughly $52B. The move "threatens to escalate a bidding contest" that is already underway over Fox’s European satellite business -- and "further complicate a global game of M&A chess that’s being waged by the biggest media companies." Comcast said in a statement that it "is considering, and is in advanced stages of preparing, an offer for the business that Fox has agreed to sell Disney." The statement added, "Any offer for Fox would be all-cash and at a premium to the value of the current all-share offer from Disney" (BLOOMBERG, 5/23). In N.Y., Hufford & Ramachandran reported Comcast "has been contemplating a renewed pursuit of Fox’s assets" since the deal with Disney was announced in December at a "lower price than Comcast had offered." Fox has since disclosed in a regulatory filing that the acquisition offer from Comcast was "largely rejected due to antitrust concerns, even though the bid was 16% higher than Disney's on a per-share basis." Fox was concerned that a deal with Comcast, "even if approved by regulators, would require the divestiture of too many valuable assets." Comcast did not offer Fox a breakup fee "in the event such a deal was blocked" in Washington, the filing said (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 5/23). CNN's Isidore & Disis reported Comcast did not "detail the exact value of its bid" on Wednesday, though sources previously said that the offer would be worth about $60B. Fox declined to comment on Wednesday. During an earnings call two weeks ago, Fox Exec Chair Lachlan Murdoch said that the company would not "engage in a lot of speculation around this," though he added that Fox is "committed to our agreement with Disney." Disney "did not immediately respond to a request for comment." The battle over Fox "is emblematic of how rapidly the media industry is changing." American consumers "are cutting their cable subscriptions and spending more time with online services" like Netflix, so legacy companies "are looking for ways to scale their business and build influence" (CNN, 5/23).
