James Murdoch has ruled out swapping British Sky Broadcasting's stake in ITV for ownership of Five, RTL's UK channel. The satellite broadcaster, which has a paper loss of about £320 million (E463m) on its 17.9 per cent stake, may be forced by the Competition Commission to sell its stake. The Commission is expected to make […]

Shareholders of Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio voted to approve Sirius’ proposed $13.6 billion acquisition of XM. The companies signed an agreement in February for a deal that has drawn close regulatory scrutiny. Terms call for Sirius to pay 4.6 shares for each XM share. Analysts say it may still be difficult for […]

Four buyout firms have been shortlisted in the race to buy British private equity firm Cinven’s 35 percent stake in French cable operator Numericable. The firms selected – PAI Partners, TPG Capital, Carlyle and Providence – must now submit a firm offer within a month, a fifth firm could still be added to the shortlist. […]

Deutsche Telekom has concluded an agreement with the French TDF group on the sale of T-Systems Media&Broadcast. The transaction has an enterprise value of E0.85 billion. The sale of Media&Broadcast is part of the 'Focus, fix and grow' strategy presented to the public by the Deutsche Telekom in March.

Spanish infrastructure company Abertis has bought a 28.4 per cent stake in satellite operator Hispasat for E199 million. Abertis said it had made the purchase through its Abertis Telecom unit from Ensafeca Holdings and it will now control 37.3 per cent of Hispasat shares as it also holds an indirect holding through its 32 per […]

From Sotires Eleftheriou in Paris According to reports in the French press, the British investment fund Cinven wants to sell up to half of its 70 per cent stake in Ypso, the holding company that owns the cable operator Numericable, for almost E2 billion. Several investment funds have expressed an interest in acquiring this 35 […]

Microsoft has beaten off competition from Google to pay $240 million for a 1.6 per cent stake in Facebook that values the popular social networking site at $15 billion. Microsoft will also sell internet ads for Facebook outside the United States as part of the deal that took several weeks of negotiating. Microsoft already provides […]

Gilat the Israeli satellite network group, is evaluating interest from several strategic and private equity buyers in buying the company. The company, which is listed on Nasdaq in the US and in Israel, could fetch more than $500m in a sale. Bids are due at the end of this week. Participating in the auction are […]

Nokia has agreed to buy US mobile advertising firm Enpocket. Nokia claims that the move will allow it to accelerate the scaling of its mobile advertising business, taking advantage of Enpocket’s platform and strong partnerships with advertisers, publishers and operators.

The Competition Commission has extended the timetable for completing its inquiry into BSkyB’s £940 million (E1.3bn) purchase of a 17.9 per cent stake in ITV until next year. It had intended to hand over the results of its inquiry to John Hutton, the secretary of state for business enterprise and regulatory reform, by November 7. […]