{"id":316441,"date":"2026-03-06T19:22:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T19:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/316441\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T19:22:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T19:22:08","slug":"byron-allen-buys-starz-stake-from-steve-mnuchin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/316441\/","title":{"rendered":"Byron Allen Buys Starz Stake from Steve Mnuchin"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tByron Allen<\/a> is back in the media M&A business.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe mogul, whose Allen Media Group owns The Weather Channel, a production company, local TV stations and streaming platforms, is buying a significant stake in the premium pay-TV brand Starz<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tAllen has acquired a 10.7 percent stake in Starz through his investment firm and family office Allen Family Capital. According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Allen is paying $25 million for the stake, acquiring it from the investment fund Liberty 77, led by former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.<\/p>\n

\n\tStarz, of course, was spun out from Lionsgate last year. Mnuchin had been a major investor in that company, and joined Lionsgate\u2019s board<\/a> earlier this year. His interest, however, seems to be on the studio, not in the pay-TV and streaming business that Starz is in, hence the sale.<\/p>\n

\n\tAllen, however, remains a big believer in the TV business, as the rest of his holdings underscore. Starz has been growing its streaming business<\/a> in recent quarters as it seeks to offset the challenges facing the linear TV business.<\/p>\n

\n\tAllen has been making moves: Last year he put his local TV stations up for sale, and sold some of them<\/a> to Gray Media. He has also set his sights on CBS late night, inking a deal to have his Comics Unleashed (which he also hosts, as a comic himself) on at 12:30, with an eye toward 11:30<\/a> once Stephen Colbert exits.<\/p>\n

\n\tA notice filed in connection with his purchase of the Starz stake adds that he may continue to add to his stake, and take a more active approach with the company.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cConsistent with such investment purposes, Allen may engage in communications with, without limitation, one or more shareholders of Starz, management of Starz and\/or one or more members of Starz\u2019s board of directors and may make suggestions or proposals concerning Starz\u2019s operations, prospects, business and financial strategies, strategic transactions, assets and liabilities, business and financing alternatives, the composition of the board of directors and such other matters as Allen may deem relevant to the investment in Starz,\u201d his family office wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Byron Allen is back in the media M&A business. The mogul, whose Allen Media Group owns The Weather…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316442,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[171490,156,111,139,69,7019,437],"class_list":["post-316441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-byron-allen","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-starz","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}