21st Century Fox not Interested in Bidding for Disney’s Sports Assets
Twenty-First Century Fox has said that it is not interested in bidding for Walt Disney’s regional sports networks, which the entertainment company might have to divest in order to secure a US Justice Department approval for Fox’s movie and television assets.
In November 2018, Fox chairman Lachlan Murdoch has said that it is an “open question” whether the media company will buy back the networks Fox sold to Disney as part of the $71 billion transaction.
Disney in December of 2018, initially offered to buy Fox's Fox’s film and television studios, among other businesses for $52.4 billion, only to increase its offer to $71 billion to fend off a rival bid of $65 billion from Comcast.
Walt Disney Company won a massive bidding war against Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based telecommunications conglomerate Comcast in 2018.
However, the US Justice Department ordered Disney to divest Fox’s 22 sports programming networks. Disney also owns sports network ESPN.
Following the completion of the transaction in March 2019, Fox will create a new company, which is expected to see an annual revenue of around $10 billion
