Two months after secretary of state Alastair Darling issued a special intervention notice regarding BSkyB’s purchase of a 17.9% stake in ITV, Ofcom and the Office of Fair Trading will today hand reports on the purchase to the Department of Trade and Industry.
Darling initiated the review to ascertain whether the Sky purchase raises “public interest concerns about the number of different owners of media enterprises” (see
Darling Orders Investigation Of Sky/ITV Deal).
It is expected that Darling will take around a month to decide whether to refer the case to the Competition Commission now that the reports are in.
However, the OFT could go straight to the Commission with its conclusion, with that body then launching an investigation and making a final decision.
Sky purchased the stake in ITV last November for £940 million. Sir Richard Branson said at the time: “BSkyB’s move is a blatant attempt to distort competition even further by blocking any attempt to create a strong and meaningful competitor.
“BSkyB is positioned to strongly influence ITV’s operations in a manner that favours BSkyB’s long-term plans rather than the interests of the other 82% percent of ITV shareholders who weren’t offered a sweetheart deal on Friday.”
Branson’s comments were the prelude to the current conflict between Virgin Media and Sky over the removal of the basic Sky channels from the Virgin Media platform, a conflict which now sees the two companies square up in court.
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