{"id":276977,"date":"2025-11-07T09:27:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T09:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/276977\/"},"modified":"2025-11-07T09:27:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T09:27:09","slug":"itv-confirms-talks-with-comcast-over-sale-of-networks-streaming-arm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/276977\/","title":{"rendered":"ITV Confirms Talks With Comcast Over Sale Of Networks & Streaming Arm"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tUK network ITV<\/a> has confirmed it is in talks with Comcast<\/a> over a shock \u00a31.6B ($2.1B) sale of its Media & Entertainment business.<\/p>\n

\n\tNews of the potential deal emerged out of the blue overnight,<\/a> with Comcast hoping to add the main ITV network, its suite of linear channels and the ITVX streaming business to its roster. Comcast bought UK pay-TV giant Sky in 2018 for around \u00a330B.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a statement to the stock exchange this morning, ITV said it \u201cnotes the recent\u00a0press\u00a0speculation and confirms that it\u00a0is in preliminary discussions\u00a0regarding\u00a0a\u00a0possible\u00a0sale\u00a0of\u00a0its\u00a0M&E\u00a0business to Sky\u00a0for an enterprise value of \u00a31.6B. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere can be no certainty as to the terms upon which any\u00a0potential sale\u00a0may be agreed or whether any transaction will take place. A further announcement will be made\u00a0in due course\u00a0if\u00a0appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tA deal would form a hugely powerful UK broadcasting business, as Comcast already owns Sky and a suite of production companies, such as Day of the Jackal maker Carnival through NBCUniversal. Notably, the statement points to Sky as the buyer, not its parent.<\/p>\n

\n\tWe understand Comcast isn\u2019t the only major U.S. studio to have explored a deal for ITV\u2019s broadcasting arm, which yesterday warned it was seeking to make additional cost savings of \u00a335M<\/a> at the M&E business amid a \u201csoftening\u201d British economy. The TV advertising downturn has hurt all of Europe\u2019s major commercial broadcasters and most have looked to new revenue streams to hold up their value. <\/p>\n

\n\tITV\u2019s production and sales wing, ITV Studios, which makes and sells the likes of Love Island and Line of Duty around the world, has been the subject of its own takeover talk, with the likes of All3Media parent RedBird IMI and Banijay among those known to have kicked the tyres. <\/p>\n

\n\tIt has therefore come as a surprise that it is in fact the channels business that appears closer to sale. ITV rival Channel 5 is already owned by a U.S. behemoth, Paramount-Skydance, although rumors over a sale of Channel 5 in the Skydance regime abound. Its other rival, Channel 4, has a completely different ownership structure. <\/p>\n

\n\tRevenue in the networks biz fell by 5% to \u00a31.44B over the first nine months of this year, according to yesterday\u2019s trading update.<\/p>\n

\n\tAny deal would need to worm its way through the competition regulator. Media analyst Ian Whittaker told the BBC that a combination of Sky and ITV would mean the pair had \u201c70% plus\u201d of the UK TV advertising market, which he said \u201cin normal circumstances\u201d would be rejected by regulators because of the dominance it would give them. But Peter Bazalgette, a former ITV chairman, called on regulators to be flexible given that ITV is now taking on the likes of Google and Meta in the video advertising space.<\/p>\n

\n\tITV\u2019s notoriously sticky share price shot up by 18% to 80p per share this morning, its highest figure for several weeks. This had been steadily declining since September. The network\u2019s share price has been the subject of constant discussion over the years and any sale would unlock some value for disgruntled shareholders.<\/p>\n

\n\tMax Goldbart contributed to this report<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK network ITV has confirmed it is in talks with Comcast over a shock \u00a31.6B ($2.1B) sale of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":276978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[6969,8084,88,27709,92],"class_list":{"0":"post-276977","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-comcast","9":"tag-earnings","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-itv","12":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/276978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}