Hulu Buys AT&T’s Minority Stake In Joint Venture

AT&T ditched its stake in Hulu. Although it didn't necessarily play out as expected. The telecom has reached a deal to sell its 9.5 percent stake in Hulu (worth about $1.43 billion) back to the joint venture. 

It's not certain exactly how this will shift the balance of power or affect content, but Hulu chief Randy Freer said AT&T's WarnerMedia would stay a "valued partner" for "years to come." AT&T said it would use the money to "reduce its debt."

Between this and Disney's acquisition of key Fox assets, Hulu's joint venture is down to just two companies Disney and Comcast. It's not yet certain just how this affects the ownership ratios but Disney already had majority control with 60 percent while Comcast had a 30 percent share.

AT&T's WarnerMedia is developing its own streaming service and it's expected to be a lot like Hulu, just with an emphasis on in house properties like Warner Bros., HBO, and Turner.


Source: AT&T

Comcast Announced A $65 Billion Bid For Twenty First Century Fox

Comcast announced a $65 billion bid for Twenty First Century Fox units that are currently in agreement to be acquired by Disney.

The bid announced Wednesday represents a 19 percent premium to Disney's offer. Comcast, the parent of CNBC offered $35 a share in cash.

Disney agreed in December to buy the majority of Fox for $52.4 billion in stock. The deal included Fox's movie studios, networks National Geographic and FX, Star TV, stakes in Sky, Endemol Shine Group and Hulu, as well as regional sports networks.

"These are highly strategic and complementary businesses, and we are in our minds the right buyer," Comcast's CEO Brian Roberts said on a call with investors.

In a letter to Fox's board and members of the Murdoch family released earlier, Roberts said, "We were disappointed when Fox decided to enter into a transaction with The Walt Disney Company even though we had offered a meaningfully higher price." He went on to say, "We are pleased to present a new, all cash proposal that fully addresses the Board's stated concerns with our prior proposal."

Comcast is planning for an increased bid from Disney that may include a cash component according to people familiar with the matter. Comcast believes it is better suited to offer cash because the market allows for a higher leverage ratio from a cable company with strong cash flows than a media company like Disney, which is accustomed to carrying lower leverage ratios the people said. A Disney bid with cash will also diminish the tax benefits for the Murdoch family, which controls Fox.


Source: The Verge

Disney Has Announced A Deal To Buy 21st Century Fox In A Deal Worth Around $66B, Includes Hulu Stake

Walt Disney has announced a deal to buy a big portion of 21st Century Fox, in a deal worth around $66B made up of $52.4B in stock and an estimated $13.7B in net debt.

The purchase excludes Fox News, Fox Business, and Fox Sports but includes all of the entertainment assets including Fox’s 30% stake in Hulu. Coupled with Disney’s existing 30% share in Hulu, that gives Walt Disney a controlling interest of 60% in Hulu.

Amazon Announces Fire TV

Amazon’s Fire TV has three times the power of any of the competitors listed above. It’s packs a quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM and a dedicated graphics processor for fast, fluid playback. It also has dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi to enable instant streaming with a feature called “ASAP” that pre-loads videos based on what you’ve watched previously. The more you use Fire TV, the more accurate ASAP gets.

Amazon Fire TV has a remote and a search aspect that Amazon is hyping. The entire interface is incredibly fluid and easy to navigate, and the remote contains a microphone that can be used for quick voice search. This is a huge improvement over most set-top boxes that require you to search by typing a query one letter at a time.

In addition to its ability to stream video, Fire TV can play games, stream music, create slideshows of your photos and even launch a kid mode dubbed FreeTime that includes tons of free content from Amazon Prime. Fire TV isn't a closed ecosystem with apps like Prime Instant Video, Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and Vimeo currently supported and more on the way.

Fire TV is available now from Amazon for $99. Fire TV is currently being offered with a 30-day free trial of both Netflix and Amazon Prime.

Source: Amazon

Yahoo Willing To Spend Up To $800M To Aquire Hulu

Just a few days prior we posted an article stating Yahoo! was interested in bidding on Hulu. Reports have said that Yahoo! is willing to pay in upwards of $800 million to acquire Hulu, a video streaming site which is currently owned by Disney, Fox and NBC Universal.

The acquisition of Tumblr was to bring Yahoo a demographic; the company is going through a series of drastic changes at the moment. Yahoo has cut services that aren't bringing in much traffic to the site; Yahoo has also released their own search, mail and weather apps for iOS and Android. These are all moves to bringing in more users and the acquisition of Tumblr and Hulu will help that happen.

Hulu is only as valuable as the content licenses that are signed over with the company; the exclusive content is why Hulu's users pay their monthly subscription fee. Services like Hulu are very popular among the cable cutting portion of society that doesn't want to pay for channels that they won’t watch.

Yahoo Reportedly Places Bid To Buy Hulu

Add one more name to the Hulu bidding war Yahoo!, which just announced plans to buy Tumblr for $1.1 billion, has made an offer on the video website as well.

The Web giant submitted a bid for the video site this morning, according to a person familiar with process. Other people looking to buy all or a piece of Hulu include:

• Directv,
• Time Warner Cable,
• William Morris Endeavor, along with with PE backer Silverlake,
• KKR,
• Guggenheim Digital,
• The Chernin Group

As AllThingsD reported earlier this month, Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer and COO Henrique De Castro have met with Hulu’s team recently for a get-to-know-you; Yahoo! had previously tried to buy a large stake in French video site Daily Motion, but that bid was stymied by the French government. Yahoo! declined to comment.

The question, as it always is with Hulu, is what its owners News Corp., Disney and Comcast are actually willing to sell, and at what price. The three media conglomerates provide the site’s most valuable programming, primarily via shows that have already aired on their broadcast networks. Disney and News Corp. have been at odds about the best way to manage the site for some time; Comcast gave up its management rights as a concession to Federal regulators a few years ago. (News Corp. also owns this website.)

In 2011, Hulu’s owners put the company up for sale and were looking for a bid of at least $2 billion; in exchange, they would offer content licenses that would run for two to three years. But they ended up pulling the site back off the sales block after a few months.

Last month, former News Corp. COO Peter Chernin submitted a starting bid of $500 million, with the understanding that he would be willing to pay more for extended licenses. Bloomberg first reported on the KKR and William Morris Endeavor/Silverlake bids today.

Hulu hasn't had a formal M&A process, but had asked prospective bidders to make an offer by Wednesday. That deadline apparently isn't a firm one, so it’s worth wondering if the field will grow more crowded before this over.

DirecTV Consider Bid For Hulu

DirecTV is weighing a potential bid for Hulu, the latest company to show interest in the six-year-old video site, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Hulu’s owners, including Walt Disney Co., News Corp., and Comcast Corp., are considering various strategic options for the site including a sale. Other firms that have bid or expressed interest in Hulu include cable operator Time Warner Cable Inc., Guggenheim Partners, Yahoo Inc. and former News Corp. president Peter Chernin’s investment group.

DingleBerry Brings Hulu Back To The BlackBery PlayBook

We've known even before the BlackBerry PlayBook first went on sale that it could support watching Hulu videos. Hulu was started as a joint venture between NBC Universal and News Corp (Fox) that allows US internet users to watch TV shows online. It's a great way to legally watch TV over the internet. The PlayBook's flash-running browser has no problem playing the videos; it's Hulu itself that blocks content to the tablet. Within 48 hours of the tablet's release, Hulu blocked PlayBook users from viewing that content.

DingleBerry 3.x changes that; Hulu is back on the PlayBook! Included with the latest release of the rooting tool is a new browser called HuluBerry. After following the extremely easy instructions for rooting the tablet, you'll find the HuluBerry application already installed on your device. This custom browser only browses the Hulu website. And Hulu looks great on the PlayBook.

Please note: As of late Wednesday night, it appears that the the 2.0.0.7111 developer's build of the PlayBook OS breaks HuluBerry functionality. To keep watching Hulu videos on your PlayBook, I would recommend staying on version 2.0.0.4869 or 2.0.0.6149 

Verizon considered Hulu buy

Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam recently took the stage during a UBS conference in New York where he explained that Verizon once considered purchasing Hulu. McAdam did not comment on another rumor, which suggests that Verizon is working on building its own video streaming service that could compete with the likes of Netflix and Amazon. Reuters first reported on the rumor and said the service could be deployed next year in areas where Verizon doesn’t offer its FiOS broadband and TV products. It is unclear what programming partners Verizon is speaking with, although Reuters suggested Epix or Viacom would be two content companies that might be interested. ”If this deal comes true it’s not clear to me what Verizon would bring to the table that is materially different to what others like Amazon offer,” Bernstein Research analyst Carlos Kirjner told Reuters. McAdams did admit that, while Verizon may not be purchasing Hulu now, his company “ continues to look at alternatives.”