{"id":51,"date":"2007-02-26T19:17:19","date_gmt":"2007-02-26T19:17:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.the-finance-zone.co.uk\/?p=51"},"modified":"2007-02-26T19:17:19","modified_gmt":"2007-02-26T19:17:19","slug":"bskyb-faces-ofcom-probe-over-itv-stake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/2007\/02\/26\/bskyb-faces-ofcom-probe-over-itv-stake\/","title":{"rendered":"BSkyB faces Ofcom probe over ITV stake"},"content":{"rendered":"

British Sky Broadcasting <\/font><\/a><\/strong>is facing an Ofcom investigation <\/font><\/strong><\/a>into whether its acquisition of a 17.9 per cent stake in ITV <\/font><\/a><\/strong>raises public interest concerns, in an unexpected setback for James Murdoch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s satellite broadcaster.<\/p>\n

Alastair Darling, secretary of state for trade and industry, emphasised \u00e2\u20ac\u0153that this decision only means there will be an initial investigation by Ofcom and is without prejudice to any decisions I take subsequently on whether a fuller investigation by the Competition Commission may be necessary\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n

BSkyB said in a statement <\/font><\/strong><\/a>it would \u00e2\u20ac\u0153continue to engage fully with the DTI, the OFT and Ofcom during the ongoing process.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d ITV also said it was co-operating with all the regulatory reviews.<\/div>\n

However, Mr Darling\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s move will be greeted with delight by Virgin Media, the cable company whose largest shareholder, Sir Richard Branson, had lobbied hard for an investigation into whether the investment in ITV by an associate of Rupert Murdoch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s News Corp threatened media plurality in the UK.<\/p>\n

Ofcom must advise Mr Darling by April 27 on whether the case \u00e2\u20ac\u0153raises public interest concerns about the number of different owners of media enterprises.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Mr Darling\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s decision followed a provisional finding by the Office of Fair Trading on 12 January 2007 that a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153relevant merger situation\u00e2\u20ac\u009d may have been created for the purposes of the Enterprise Act 2002 as a result of BSkyB acquiring \u00e2\u20ac\u0153material influence\u00e2\u20ac\u009d over ITV.<\/p>\n

The ruling came as BSkyB warned <\/font><\/strong><\/a>on Monday over a separate dispute with Virgin Media, relating to the fees Virgin Media pays to carry channels such as Sky One on its cable service.<\/p>\n

BSkyB said that a failure to renew the contract could cost it \u00c2\u00a315m-\u00c2\u00a320m between now and its June year end, implying a potential annualised impact on operating profits of \u00c2\u00a345m-\u00c2\u00a360m.<\/p>\n

Shares in BSkyB were little changed in afternoon London trading, slipping 1p to 563\u00c2\u00bdp. ITV shares were flat at 114\u00c2\u00bdp.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

British Sky Broadcasting is facing an Ofcom investigation into whether its acquisition of a 17.9 per cent stake in ITV<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-companies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}