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Nov 18, 2009 10:34 am US/Eastern
Comcast May Help Ticketmaster-Live Nation Deal
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
Comcast Corporation is reportedly working with Ticketmaster and Live Nation, Inc. in order to alleviate antitrust concerns from the federal government about a possible merger between the two ticketing giants. According to Bloomberg News, Comcast may inherit spinoffs of ticketing and client contracts to help grease the wheels with the Justice Department.
Antitrust regulators are trying to determine if the deal between Ticketmaster and Live Nation would inhibit competition and drive concert ticket prices even higher than they already are. Bloomberg reported that no one from any of the parties involved would comment on the possible involvement of Comcast on the antitrust concerns.
At the same time Comcast is looking to help the Ticketmaster deal, the cable giant is also involved in talks to acquire NBC Universal from General Electric. Recently, NBC Universal was valued at $30 billion, which would likely be the starting point for acquisition talks between the two companies.
Consumer advocacy groups are asking regulators to block a Comcast-NBC deal because it would place too much content under the control of one company. Comcast could also be setting itself for a failure, as Time-Warner learned when it was sold to AOL in the late 1990's. Time-Warner's flagship news station CNN has still not recovered from the damage done to its product since the merger.
If Comcast did acquire NBC-Universal, it would set up an interesting dilemma for Comcast, because Comcast has run afoul of the FCC for throttling internet subscriber speeds, which led to net neutrality rules being proposed by the FCC. If Comcast could control that much of the cable spectrum and the high-speed lines of communication, it would put the government in a tough spot to allow the merger to go through without modifications to the business model proposed.
source:
Bloomberg News
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