Comcast Pulls Out of Deal with Time Warner
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Justin Sullivan/Getty Images(NEW YORK) — The proposed marriage of Comcast and Time Warner Cable is over.
Comcast will announced in a written statement Friday that it is walking away from the $45 billion deal involving it purchasing Time Warner stock.
“Today, we move on. Of course, we would have liked to bring our great products to new cities, but we structured this deal so that if the government didn’t agree, we could walk away,” Comcast Chairman and CEO Brian Roberts said in the statement released Friday morning.
Federal regulators apparently had concerns about the two communications giants forming a veritable cable TV behemoth with an even bigger reach in metropolitan areas. Attorney General Eric Holder had praise for the two companies’ decision to terminate the deal.
“The companies’ decision to abandon this deal is the best outcome for American consumers,” Holder said Friday in a Justice Department statement. “The Antitrust Division of the United States Department of Justice has demonstrated, time and again, that it can and will defend the interests of the American consumer no matter the complexity of the issue or the size of the opponent. This is a victory not only for the Department of Justice, but also for providers of content and streaming services who work to bring innovative products to consumers across America and around the world. I commend the Antitrust attorneys and investigators whose outstanding work led to this outcome, and I know that the Department of Justice will continue to fight for fair access and free competition in every industry and every market.”
There were reports that the Justice Department had been leaning against the merger and perhaps even more devastating for Comcast, the Federal Communications Commission wanted an administrative judge to rule on the deal’s merits, frequently the death knell for such transactions.
Consumer groups will undoubtedly cheer the news that Comcast has backed out. They said previously that the planned deal would crush competition and allow the new company to hike rates, which they allege are already too high.
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