In 2013, the media entrepreneur Rupert Murdoch divided his corporation into News Corp. and 21st Century Fox. That was ten years ago. As a result of the change, 21st Century Fox now includes the Fox News Channel, FX, Fox broadcast network, National Geographic, Fox Sports, and the 20th Century Fox film studios. The New York Post, Wall Street Journal, HarperCollins book publishing, the Australian, the Times of London, and several other Australian media outlets were all retained by News Corp in the meantime.
Fox News Corporation was not a component of the 2019 sale of 21st Century Fox to the Disney Corporation. The boards of the two businesses revealed last year that they might once more combine into one entity. Several months later, the merger of the organizations is a total failure.
The New York Times reports that on January 24, News Corp issued a statement expressing Murdoch’s decision that a merger of the two businesses was “not optimal for shareholders of News Corp and Fox at this time.”
Murdoch apparently had an interest in the potential cost-saving effects that could be realized by combining the two businesses. One management staff and one vendor agreement, for instance, could have allowed them to save money. The Murdoch Family Trust approved the creation of committees to investigate the prospect of a merger.
Investors, who were informed in 2013 that the companies would be better off separately, quickly opposed the notion. Murdoch informed investors that he had no plan of combining the two companies when he sold 21st Century Fox in 2019. Given the extent of News Corp’s holdings, some with stakes in the firms started to wonder if it was a wise idea or if it would equitably benefit each company. Strangely, News Corp was the smaller of the two during the firms’ first split, but now it has a sizable amount of assets, including a sizable real estate company.
Irenic Capital released a statement to Business Wire regarding the dissolution of the merger. 2.6% of News Corp. is owned by the management firm. Adam Katz, the co-founder, said Irenic Capital was “encouraged” by Murdoch’s declaration that the deal was through. He claimed that it was “the right decision,” and that the “News Corp has an opportunity to create substantial value for its owners.”
The Hollywood Reporter was informed by Cowen analyst Doug Creutz that investor T. Because it stated that it thought merging the firms would have devalued the shares for News Corp., Rowe may have played a role in canceling the deal.
