US wireless and broadband communications provider AT&T Inc on Thursday announced the close of its US$85 billion merger with media and entertainment conglomerate Time Warner Inc.
The news came just two days after a US federal judge approved the deal, delivering a stinging rebuke to US President Donald Trump’s administration in its first major antitrust court case.
“We’re going to bring a fresh approach to how the media and entertainment industry works for consumers, content creators, distributors and advertisers,” AT&T chief executive Randall Stephenson said in a statement announcing that the acquisition was completed.
The merger comes as the way video is created, distributed and consumed is rapidly changing in an age of streaming digital content to a broad spectrum of Internet-linked devices, Stephenson said.
“The content and creative talent at Warner Bros., HBO and Turner are first-rate,” Stephenson said. “Combine all that with AT&T’s strengths in direct-to-consumer distribution, and we offer customers a differentiated, high-quality, mobile-first entertainment experience.”
US Department of Justice officials who opposed the deal in court did not to ask a judge to put the merger on hold pending a legal appeal, but the option to appeal remained available.
The case has been closely watched as setting a benchmark for other big corporate mergers, especially in the media and communications sector.
Trump has denounced the AT&T deal, vowing that his administration would block it because it would concentrate corporate power unacceptably.
This fueled speculation that Trump could be retaliating due to critical coverage of his administration by news broadcaster CNN, a Time Warner property.
“Trump’s meddling in law enforcement actions, his attacks upon particular companies and his utter unpredictability have created the kind of legal uncertainty common in ‘banana republics,’” Berin Szoka of the think tank Tech Freedom said after the judge’s decision.
The deal brings together AT&T’s wireless and broadband networks and its DirecTV subscription service with the media assets of Time Warner, which include CNN and other Turner cable channels, Cartoon Network, premium channel HBO and the Warner Bros studios.
AT&T and Time Warner said that they need more scale to compete with online rivals, such as Netflix Inc and Amazon.com Inc, and with Silicon Valley giants like Google, Facebook Inc and Apple Inc, which are expanding in the rapidly evolving sector.
The merger comes after Comcast Corp on Wednesday offered US$65 billion for key film and TV assets of Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox Inc, topping an offer from Walt Disney Co for a deal that could create a dominant media-entertainment power.
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