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The parent company of Sky is in talks to buy ITV’s broadcasting business for about £2bn, two decades after James Murdoch made an audacious move to become the biggest shareholder in the UK’s largest commercial free-to-air broadcaster.
US media company Comcast, which owns assets including Universal Studios and bought Rupert Murdoch’s Sky for £30bn in 2018, is in talks to buy ITV’s broadcasting arm, which includes its TV channels and streaming service ITVX.
The move, which would upend the UK broadcasting landscape, reignites the ambitions of Rupert’s youngest son, James, who acquired a 17.9% stake in ITV for £940m in 2006.
A deal would not involve its production arm ITV Studios – the maker of shows including Love Island, I’m a Celebrity and hit drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office – which has been the subject of separate takeover talks.
Sky, which took the stake to block a move by Richard Branson to buy ITV after cable companies NTL and Telewest merged to create Virgin Media, was ultimately forced by regulators to sell its holding.
ITV’s largest single shareholder, Liberty Global, which jointly owns Virgin Media O2 with Spanish telecoms operator Telefónica, halved its 10% stake in ITV last month.
The broadcaster’s share price has slumped to £2.5bn, about 75% below levels seen a decade ago, as the Netflix-led streaming revolution has hammered the stocks of traditional broadcasters.
On Thursday, ITV reported that it would “temporarily” cut £35m from its budgets as it deals the poor macroeconomic environment and advertiser uncertainty ahead of the budget later this month.
The company said it expected advertising revenues, which still account for most of its income, to fall by 9% in the key fourth-quarter advertising in the run-up to Christmas.
ITV is being advised by banks Robey Warshaw and Morgan Stanley.
The performance of ITV Studios has led analysts to argue that the production arm alone could be worth more than the broadcasting business, which includes some of the UK’s most popular channels in linear.
Since buying Sky at a premium in a bidding war in 2018, Comcast has written down the value of the business by billions of dollars, mainly due to the poor performance of European operations in Italy and Germany.
Sky UK, which controls rights to crown-jewel assets including most of the rights to the Premier League, remains highly profitable.
In June, Comcast agreed to sell its German pay-TV business to RTL, the former owner of Channel 5 in the UK, for €150m.
ITV, Sky and Comcast declined to comment.
