Edmund Lee

Judge Victor Marrero of the United States District Court in Manhattan ruled in favor of T-Mobile’s takeover of Sprint in a deal that would further concentrate corporate ownership of technology, combining the nation’s third- and fourth-largest wireless carriers and creating a new telecommunications giant to take on AT&T and Verizon. The decision concluded an unusual suit filed in June by attorneys general from 13 states and the District of Columbia. The challenge was brought after regulators at the Department of Justice and Federal Communications Commission approved the deal.

Comcast announced an offer worth $65 billion for the bulk of 21st Century Fox’s businesses, setting up a showdown with the Walt Disney Company for Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. The all-cash bid by Comcast, the largest cable company in the United States, came a day after a federal judge approved a merger between AT&T and Time Warner. Comcast executives had awaited the decision in that case before mounting their bid for 21st Century Fox.

Comcast continues to shift its emphasis from being a cable TV company to being a digital company. Comcast has: 19 million cable subscribers, a loss of 491,000 since December; 31 million broadband internet subscribers; a gain of 461,000; and 42 million sign-ups to the streaming platform Peacock, a jump of 9 million. Comcast sells something that has proved more durable than sports and entertainment: broadband, the piping that carries all streaming platforms. In the first quarter, sales increased 12 percent, to $5.6 billion.

Warner Bros. broke with tradition by announcing that it would release its entire lineup of 2021 films on HBO Max — its struggling streaming service — on the same day they were scheduled to appear in theaters. Hollywood agents and filmmakers were angered by the move — but they may have forgotten something crucial: Warner Bros. belongs to WarnerMedia, which is part of AT&T.

The Walt Disney Company has agreed to acquire Comcast’s one-third stake in Hulu and to take full control of the streaming service. The sale price would be at least $5.8 billion and could climb once an independent party assesses Hulu’s fair market value. The potential payout is based on Hulu’s current $27.5 billion valuation (in April 2019, it was valued at $15.8 billion). Hulu had 28 million subscribers at the end of April, a 12 percent jump since the end of last year. Although it is expected to lose more than $1.5 billion in 2019, Robert A.

The digital publishing industry took a big hit in recent days, when more than 1,000 employees were laid off at BuzzFeed, AOL, Yahoo and HuffPost. The cuts at BuzzFeed were the most alarming. Wasn’t this the company that was supposed to have it all figured out?  But look past the gloom, and a complicated narrative emerges that does not lend itself to a one-size-fits-all interpretation of What Went Wrong or a handy forecast of journalism’s future.

Twenty-First Century Fox agreed to sell its 39 percent stake in the British broadcaster Sky to Comcast in a deal worth $15 billion, ending Rupert Murdoch’s yearslong ambition to take full ownership of the satellite service he helped found three decades ago. Murdoch, the executive co-chairman of 21st Century Fox, sold most of his empire to the Walt Disney Company this summer. The proceeds of the Sky sale will go to Disney, which plans to invest the money in its newest effort to sell its content directly to viewers via streaming services.

Comcast and the Walt Disney Company have long been rivals. But Brian Roberts, who runs Comcast, has recently become the Magic Kingdom’s nemesis in chief. He waged an unrelenting fight for 21st Century Fox over the summer, forcing Disney to pay about $18 billion more than it had planned in order to secure Rupert Murdoch’s entertainment empire. Then, on Sept 22, Comcast emerged as the decisive victor in a battle with Disney for control of the British pay-television company Sky. For Robert A.

Change is coming to HBO, now that it is part of the AT&T corporate family. John Tankey is a longtime AT&T executive who now oversees HBO in his new role as chief executive of Warner Media. He told employees that HBO would have to become more like a streaming giant to thrive in the new media landscape. Stankey described a future in which HBO would substantially increase its subscriber base and the number of hours that viewers spend watching its shows.

The Department of Justice approved the Walt Disney Company’s $71 billion bid for the entertainment assets of 21st Century Fox, potentially complicating Comcast’s desire to make a rival offer for Rupert Murdoch’s entertainment empire. The government’s approval was filed in federal court on the condition that Disney, which already owns ESPN, divest all of Fox’s 22 regional sports networks, which include valuable channels like the Yankees’ YES network.