Tag: iab-mergers and acquisitions

Wilbur Ross Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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Here’s a look at the life of former Commerce Secretary Wilbur L. Ross Jr.

Birth date: November 28, 1937

Birth place: Weehawken, New Jersey

Birth name: Wilbur Louis Ross Jr.

Father: Wilbur Louis Ross Sr., a lawyer

Mother: Agnes (O’Neill) Ross, a teacher

Marriages: Hilary (Geary) Ross (October 9, 2004); Betsy (McCaughey) Ross (December 7, 1995-August 2000, divorced); Judith (Nodine) Ross (May 26, 1961-October 1995, divorced)

Children: with Judith Nodine: Jessica and Amanda

Education: Yale University, A.B., 1959, Harvard University, M.B.A., 1961

He was called the “King of Bankruptcy,” as he built new companies from the assets of defaulted ones.

Ross was known for investing in distressed companies in a wide range of industries including auto parts, steel, textiles and financial services.

1976-2000 – Works for the investment bank Rothschild Inc. During his tenure, he becomes a top bankruptcy adviser.

January 1998 – Pledges $2.25 million towards then-wife and Lt. Governor Betsy McCaughey Ross’ campaign for governor of New York. He withdraws the funding in September and files for divorce in November.

2000 – Purchases a small fund he started at Rothschild and opens his own private equity firm, WL Ross & Co. LLC.

2002 – Establishes the International Steel Group (ISG), with himself as chairman of the board, through a series of mergers and acquisitions starting with Bethlehem Steel Corp.

December 2003 – ISG goes public.

2004 – Forms the International Coal Group (ICG) after purchasing the assets of Horizon Natural Resources in a bankruptcy auction.

October 2004 – Merges ISG with Mittal Steel for $4.5 billion.

January 2, 2006 – Twelve miners are killed after an explosion at a West Virginia mine operated by an ICG subsidiary. Families of the dead and Randal McCloy, the lone survivor, sue ICG and WL Ross claiming negligence. All of the lawsuits are settled by November 2011.

April 2010 – Purchases a 21% stake in Richard Branson’s Virgin Money. In November 2011, Ross helps Branson fund a successful bid for the British bank Northern Rock.

August 2, 2010 – During an interview with Charlie Rose, Ross states that he’s fine with higher taxes on the wealthy as long as the government puts the money to good use.

June 2011 – Arch Coal, Inc. acquires ICG for $3.4 billion.

September 2011 – WL Ross is one of five US and Canadian companies that purchase a 34.9% stake in the Bank of Ireland. Ross’ share is reportedly 9.3%.

March 21, 2016 – Nexeo Solutions, a chemical distribution company, announces their merger agreement with WL Ross Holding Corporation. The merger is valued at nearly $1.6 billion.

August 24, 2016 – The Securities and Exchange Commission announces that WL Ross will pay a $2.3 million fine for failing to properly disclose fees it charged.

November 30, 2016 – Ross announces in a CNBC interview that President-elect Donald Trump has asked him to serve as his commerce secretary.

February 27, 2017 – The Senate confirms Ross as commerce secretary by a 72-27 vote. He is sworn in the next day.

November 5, 2017 – The New York Times reports that Ross has financial ties to a shipping company whose clients include a Russian energy company co-owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s son-in-law. Another customer of the shipping company is Venezuela’s state-run oil company, which has been sanctioned by the US government. The information comes from the Paradise Papers, a release of 13.4 million leaked documents.

November 7, 2017 – Two days after the Paradise Papers are released, Forbes reports that Ross inflated his net worth to be included in the magazine’s annual list of the world’s wealthiest individuals. His name is removed from the magazine’s website. An investigation by the magazine reveals that Ross has likely been providing inaccurate financial information since 2004. Ross claims that the magazine overlooked trusts for his family while tallying his fortune.

March 2, 2018 – During an appearance on CNBC, Ross says the Trump administration’s steel and aluminum tariffs won’t hurt consumers. He holds up a can of Campbell’s soup as he explains that the price of soup will go up less than a penny due to the tariffs.

March 26, 2018 – Ross announces that a citizenship question will be added to the 2020 census.

July 12, 2018 – Ross admits to “errors” in failing to divest assets required by his government ethics agreement and says he will sell all his stock holdings. The admission comes after the Office of Government Ethics took Ross to task for what it said were inconsistencies in his financial disclosure forms.

September 21, 2018 – A federal judge rules that Ross must sit for a deposition in a lawsuit regarding his department’s decision to include a question about citizenship in the 2020 census. The US Supreme Court later blocks the deposition.

December 19, 2018 – The Center for Public Integrity reports that Ross failed to sell a bank stock holding within the required time frame after his 2017 confirmation and subsequently signed ethics documents indicating the holding had been sold.

February 15, 2019 – Ross’ financial disclosure form is rejected by the Office of Government Ethics. Ross later releases a statement saying, “While I am disappointed that my report was not certified, I remain committed to complying with my ethics agreement and adhering to the guidance of Commerce ethics officials.”

June 27, 2019 – The Supreme Court issues a 5-4 ruling that blocks the citizenship question from being added to the census.

July 17, 2019 – The House votes to hold Ross in criminal contempt over a dispute related to the citizenship question on the census. Attorney General William Barr is also held in contempt. Ross releases a statement in which he dismisses the vote as a political stunt. “House Democrats never sought to have a productive relationship with the Trump Administration, and today’s PR stunt further demonstrates their unending quest to generate headlines instead of operating in good faith with our Department.”

July 18, 2020 – A department spokesman says that Ross has been hospitalized for “minor, non-coronavirus related issues.” On July 27, the Commerce Department says Ross has been released from the hospital.

September 28, 2020 – Ross announces that he intends to conclude the 2020 census on October 5. This is more than three weeks earlier than expected and against the October 31 court reinstated end date. Ross asks Census Bureau officials if the earlier date would effectively allow them to produce a final set of numbers during Trump’s current term in office, according to an internal email released the following day as part of a lawsuit.

October 13, 2020 – The Supreme Court grants a request from the Trump administration to halt the census count while an appeal plays out over a lower court’s order that it continue. The Census Bureau announces that the count is ending on October 15.

July 19, 2021 – According to a letter made public from Commerce Department Inspector General Peggy Gustafson to Democratic lawmakers, the Justice Department decides to decline prosecution of Ross for misrepresentations he made to Congress about the origins of the Trump administration’s failed push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

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November 10, 2023
Screen Actors Guild Fast Facts | CNN

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Here’s a look at the Screen Actors Guild. In 2012, a merger was completed between the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). The SAG-AFTRA labor union has more than 160,000 members.

June 30, 1933 – Articles of incorporation are filed. The guild is formed to get better working conditions for actors.

1935 – Granted an American Federation of Labor charter.

May 1937 – In order to prevent a strike, producers sign a contract with the guild ensuring minimum pay and recognizing the guild.

1943 – Actress Olivia de Havilland sues Warner Brothers studio for extending her contract. She later wins her case.

1945 – The US Supreme Court hands down the “de Havilland decision,” which declares that studios may no longer hold contract players for more than seven years. This breaks up the system of the studio maintaining control over an actor’s career.

1952 – The Guild signs its first contracts for filmed television programs.

December 1, 1952-February 18, 1953 – The first SAG strike is over filmed television commercials. The strike ends with a contract that covers all work in commercials.

August 5-15, 1955 – SAG holds its second strike. This time for increased television show residuals.

March 7, 1960-April 18, 1960 – Third strike over residuals for feature films sold, licensed, or released to television.

December 19, 1978-February 7, 1979 – SAG strikes for better residuals on television advertisements.

July 21, 1980-October 23, 1980 – SAG strikes with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). This strike centers on the distribution of profits from pay television and video cassette production.

March 21, 1988-April 15, 1988 – SAG and AFTRA television commercials strike. The strike is over payment for commercials appearing on cable TV.

February 25, 1995 – The first annual Screen Actors Guild Awards show is held.

May 1, 2000-October 30, 2000 – SAG and AFTRA strike against the advertising industry over commercial work compensation for basic cable and internet.

July 1, 2008 – SAG’s TV/theatrical agreement expires.

November 22, 2008 – Talks between SAG and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers (AMPTP) end after federal mediation fails to jumpstart a five-month stalemate.

January 26, 2009 – SAG chief negotiator Doug Allen is fired in a bid by the union’s moderate faction to re-enter contract talks with the studios.

April 19, 2009 – SAG leadership split 53% – 47% to accept a new two-year contract with AMPTP.

June 9, 2009 – Members ratify the two-year contract covering television and motion pictures.

January 29, 2012 – Ken Howard, president of the guild, announces during the SAG Awards, that the merger between SAG and AFTRA has been approved by both groups.

March 30, 2012 – The merger of SAG and AFTRA is completed with more than 80% approval from both unions. The one union is named SAG-AFTRA.

January 27, 2013 – The first SAG Awards are held under the union banner “SAG-AFTRA One Union.”

March 23, 2016 – SAG-AFTRA President Ken Howard dies. Executive Vice President Gabrielle Carteris assumes his duties until the regularly scheduled national board meeting April 9.

April 9, 2016 – Carteris is elected president. She will serve the balance of Howard’s unexpired term, which ends in 2017.

August 24, 2017 – Carteris is elected to a two-year term as president.

February 10, 2018 – SAG-AFTRA introduces new guidelines for members, called “Four Pillars of Change,” aimed at fighting sexual harassment in the workplace.

September 2, 2021 – Actress Fran Drescher is elected to a two-year term as president.

July 14, 2023 – SAG-AFTRA goes on strike after talks with major studios and streaming services have failed. It is the first time its members have stopped work since 1980. On November 8, SAG-AFTRA and the studios reach a tentative agreement, officially ending the strike.

Ralph Morgan 1933, 1938-1940
Eddie Cantor 1933-1935
Robert Montgomery 1935-1938, 1946-1947
Edward Arnold 1940-1942
James Cagney 1942-1944
George Murphy 1944-1946
Ronald Reagan 1947-1952, 1959-1960
Walter Pidgeon 1952-1957
Leon Ames 1957-1958
Howard Keel 1958-1959
George Chandler 1960-963
Dana Andrews 1963-1965
Charlton Heston 1965-1971
John Gavin 1971-1973
Dennis Weaver 1973-1975
Kathleen Nolan 1975-1979
William Schallert 1979-1981
Ed Asner 1981-1985
Patty Duke 1985-1988
Barry Gordon 1988-1995
Richard Masur 1995-1999
William Daniels 1999-2001
Melissa Gilbert 2001-2005
Alan Rosenberg 2005-2009
Ken Howard 2009-2016
Gabrielle Carteris-2016-2021
Fran Drescher 2021-present

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November 9, 2023
US Steel receiving acquisition offers as company promises to maximize stockholder value | CNN Business

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United States Steel Corp. (X) is considering a sale after fielding acquisition offers, according to a Sunday press release from the company.

The steel producer is under a formal review process after “receiving multiple unsolicited proposals” for both specific assets and the entire firm, the release announced.

“U. S. Steel’s Board and management team are committed to maximizing value for our stockholders, and to that end, we have commenced a comprehensive and thorough review of strategic alternatives,” wrote David Burritt, U. S. Steel’s CEO. “The Board is taking a measured approach to considering these proposals, including seeking more information in order to evaluate proposals that are preliminary and subject to ongoing due diligence and review.”

There is currently no set timeline or end date for the review process.

This is a developing story

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August 13, 2023
Microsoft gives ground on streaming in bid to remove UK block on Activision deal | CNN Business

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CNN
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Microsoft has made a major concession to UK authorities in a bid to remove the last remaining regulatory obstacle to its huge takeover of Activision Blizzard.

The companies have submitted a new proposal to the UK antitrust watchdog — the only regulator worldwide standing in the way of the $69 billion deal — that would see Activision’s (ATVI) cloud streaming rights outside the European Union and three other European countries sold to a rival, Ubisoft Entertainment. Microsoft President Brad Smith said in a blog post Tuesday that the companies believe the new proposal “presents a substantially different transaction” for the CMA to consider than its previous merger agreement.

“We believe that this development is positive for players, the progression of the cloud game streaming market, and for the growth of our industry,” Smith said.

The restructured deal, announced by the UK Competition and Markets Authority Tuesday, follows a decision by the CMA to block the acquisition on its original terms. That move put it at odds with EU regulators, which approved the plan in May. A US federal court also said in July that it would not block the deal from closing.

CMA chief executive Sarah Cardell said the regulator would now consider the new proposal.

“Our goal has not changed — any future decision on this new deal will ensure that the growing cloud gaming market continues to benefit from open and effective competition driving innovation and choice.”

Under the restructured deal, Ubisoft — a French video game developer — will be able to license out Activision’s content to any cloud gaming provider outside the European Economic Area, including in the United Kingdom. Shares in Ubisoft jumped 7% in Paris Tuesday.

“This will allow gamers to access Activision’s games in different ways, including through cloud-based multigame subscription services,” Cardell said.

Microsoft and Activision agreed last month to extend their merger deadline by three months to October 18, to allow more time to come to an agreement with the CMA. October 18 is now also the statutory deadline for a CMA decision on the new merger proposal, and Microsoft said it expects the agency’s review process to be completed ahead of that date.

Microsoft (MSFT) announced the planned acquisition of Activision early last year. The transaction was valued at $69 billion at the time, making it one of the tech industry’s largest deals.

Activision Blizzard is one of the world’s biggest video game developers, producing games such as “Candy Crush,” “Call of Duty,” “World of Warcraft” and “Overwatch.”

–CNN’s Clare Duffy contributed to this report.

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August 2, 2023
Thousands of Americans are leaving homes in flood-risk areas. But where are they moving to? | CNN

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For more than four decades, the US government has been paying cities and states to move homeowners away from areas that are at high risk of severe flooding.

When a hurricane or major flooding event devastates an area, a neighborhood can send a request for the local or state government to buy the impacted land and give residents money to start over someplace else.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s buyout program is a form of so-called “managed retreat” – a long process that relocates people, businesses, homes and infrastructure to an area that’s safer from the impacts of climate change-fueled weather events. But until recently, little was known about where people ultimately moved and whether their new location actually reduced their flood risk.

A new study published in the journal Environmental Research Letters — which coincides with a managed retreat conference unfolding in New York City this week — provides a clearer picture of these home buyouts.

Data from thousands of home buyouts shows people aren’t moving that far from their original homes — and often they are moving within the same floodplain. But overall, their risk of flooding decreased after the move, a nod to the program’s success. Researchers also found that race has played a role in who is moving and where they’re relocating to.

“As climate change and rising insurance costs increase the pressures to retreat from the coast and flooded areas, we need to pay more attention to where people are going,” James Elliott, a professor of sociology at Rice University and a co-author on the study, told CNN.

The findings “point to how the program plays out differently in different types of communities and neighborhoods across the country,” he said.

Using flood risk estimates, housing values, race and income data from the US Census Bureau, and FEMA relocation data between 1990 and 2017, researchers from Rice University built a nationwide database to map out where nearly 10,000 Americans sold their flood-prone homes and where they moved.

They found people who have taken advantage of the FEMA buyouts typically did not move that far to reduce their risk, and usually stayed within the same floodplain.

On average, buyout participants reduced their future flood risk by up to 65%, Elliott said. The average driving distance between their former homes and their new ones was around seven miles, with almost 74% of homeowners remaining within 20 miles of their old, flood-damaged homes.

The findings were also racially segmented, Elliot said. About 96% of homeowners who relocated from a predominantly White neighborhood ended up moving to another majority White community.

In contrast, residents of predominantly Black and Hispanic communities were far more likely to relocate to a new neighborhood with a different demographic: Only 48 percent of Black homeowners who go through the buyout moved to predominantly Black neighborhoods.

The study also found that buyout areas with predominantly White homeowners had a nearly 90% chance of flooding by 2050, while majority-Black buyout areas had a roughly 50% chance, suggesting that White residents tend to only participate in buyouts when flood risk is much more intense.

Though the data suggests that homeowners in White neighborhoods have a higher tolerance for flood risk, 80% of the people who took advantage of the FEMA program previously lived in majority-White neighborhoods. This could be because White communities “are more successful at winning the opportunity and money to participate” in the FEMA program, Elliott said.

The home buyout program, which is the largest managed-retreat initiative in the country so far, is “disproportionately targeted toward Whiter residential areas,” Elliott said.

“Communities of color and lower income areas just have fewer options to move nearby, so they are less likely to participate in the managed buyout,” Elliott said. In Houston, he found in a previous study that most of the people participating in buyouts in racially diverse communities tend to be White homeowners.

“It’s sort of the last wave of White flight in those neighborhoods,” he added. And when “flood risks come, the final White residents begin to pull up stakes through the buyout program and move further out.”

Alexander de Sherbinin, a senior research scientist at the Columbia Climate School and deputy manager of NASA’s Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center, said it’s not clear from the study that White homeowners are reluctant to move to racially diverse neighborhoods, and noted that there is evidence to the contrary.

De Sherbinin pointed out that there is a process of “climate gentrification” playing out in areas that have experienced climate disasters, “whereby more affluent households are moving into ethnically diverse neighborhoods that are less at risk of flooding, and are even displacing local residents.”

He pointed to Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood as an example of this phenomenon, where higher ground helps protect the neighborhood from sea level rise and higher storm surges.

“The research findings make sense in one regard, which is that whiter, more affluent neighborhoods are more likely to have the insurance coverage and resources to stay in place, despite rising risks,” de Sherbinin told CNN. “In other words, they’re able to rebuild, and possibly accommodate risks by raising their houses above flood lines.”

As the climate crisis advances, more homeowners and businesses will be forced to relocate, adding stress and vulnerability to new regions. Previous research has shown that climate migration will become more likely as the planet warms and people seek places they consider safer and more stable.

“We really need to think about how people relocate locally, what the options are, and how the ongoing racial segregation, especially in urban environments, is affecting those local retreats and people’s decisions and abilities not to retreat, because all we see are the people who actually say yes to the program,” Elliott said.

“That’s the classic thing with climate change — it’s not about ‘if’ people have to move from these places, but ‘when and how’.”

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June 21, 2023
Tom Brady buys partial stake in WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces | CNN

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Seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady has acquired an ownership stake in the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces, team owner Mark Davis announced Thursday.

“I am very excited to be part of the Las Vegas Aces organization,” said Brady in a statement on Thursday. “I have always been a huge fan of women’s sports, and I admire the work that the Aces’ players, staff, and the WNBA continue to do to grow the sport and empower future generations of athletes. To be able to contribute in any way to that mission as a member of the Aces organization is an incredible honor.”

Brady said his love for women’s sports grew out of watching his older sisters, who were “by far the best athletes in our house!”

Brady announced his retirement from the NFL in February after 23 seasons with the New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers. During his long career, the three-time league MVP set almost every passing record, including regular season passing yards (89,214) and passing touchdowns (649). He has also amassed the most wins of any player in NFL history (251).

“Since I purchased the Aces, our goal has been to win on and off the court,” said Davis, who also owns the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders. “Tom Brady is a win not only for the Aces, and the WNBA, but for women’s professional sports as a whole.”

Honored to be joining the @LVAces family, a world class organization with a team of incredible athletes pic.twitter.com/JGU4tndZR2

— Tom Brady (@TomBrady) March 23, 2023

Davis purchased the WNBA franchise before the 2021 season. Brady’s partial acquisition of the team is subject to WNBA approval.

The Aces enter the upcoming season as reigning WNBA champions. The team opens the season against the Seattle Storm on May 20 at Climate Pledge Arena in Washington.

In October, Brady joined the ownership group of an expansion Major League Pickleball team, along with former tennis World No. 1 Kim Clijsters, who in December attended the draft to support their new squad, the Las Vegas Night Owls.

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March 23, 2023
Amazon closes its acquisition of One Medical, but scrutiny of the deal is not over | CNN Business

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Washington, DC
CNN
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Amazon closed its acquisition of health care provider One Medical and its parent in a $3.9 billion deal on Wednesday, hours after the Federal Trade Commission said it would not challenge the purchase but that regulators were still investigating potential competitive and consumer harms of the transaction.

The landmark deal will turn the e-commerce giant into a provider of primary medical care with access to more than 200 brick-and-mortar doctors’ offices, along with roughly 815,000 One Medical members, according to that company’s latest financial statement.

The One Medical deal would also allow Amazon to expand its telehealth services and acquire valuable relationships with hospital systems, industry analysts have said.

On Wednesday, Amazon said One Medical will offer new customers a $55 discount on annual memberships for a limited time.

“We’re on a mission to make it dramatically easier for people to find, choose, afford, and engage with the services, products, and professionals they need to get and stay healthy, and coming together with One Medical is a big step on that journey,” said Neil Lindsay, senior vice president of Amazon Health Services, in a release. “One Medical has set the bar for what a quality, convenient, and affordable primary care experience should be like. We’re inspired by their human-centered, technology-forward approach and excited to help them continue to grow and serve more patients.”

But while Amazon can consummate the deal without the immediate threat of an FTC antitrust suit, the agency is still investigating the acquisition and can still challenge the deal after the fact.

“The FTC’s investigation of Amazon’s acquisition of One Medical continues,” said FTC spokesman Douglas Farrar. “The commission will continue to look at possible harms to competition created by this merger, as well as possible harms to consumers that may result from Amazon’s control and use of sensitive consumer health information held by One Medical.”

The FTC plans to warn Amazon it may close the deal at its own risk, an agency official said. Known as a “pre-consummation warning,” the FTC began sending such letters to merging companies in 2021 in response to a surge in proposed deals that threatened to overwhelm regulators’ investigative capacity.

The warning highlights the continued legal risk for Amazon and the potential concerns driving the FTC probe. Worries include not only the potential for Amazon to entrench its economic dominance but also fears that its acquisition of valuable health data could lead to the misuse of that information for other purposes, such as targeted advertising or e-commerce, the agency official said.

Amazon’s deal to acquire One Medical follows its 2018 purchase of the online pharmacy service PillPack, which later became Amazon Pharmacy. Separately, Amazon partnered with JPMorgan Chase and Berkshire Hathaway on an effort to provide better health care services and insurance at a lower cost to workers and families at the three companies, and possibly other businesses, too. That effort, called Haven, shut down in 2021.

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February 22, 2023
Beyoncé is going on tour. Will Ticketmaster be able to handle it? | CNN Business

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Good news: Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour is happening. Bad news: Fans are already gearing up for a difficult time getting tickets, especially following Ticketmaster’s botched ticket rollout for Taylor Swift’s Eras tour.

Beyoncé announced the tour — which had been previously rumored — on Wednesday. In an Instagram post, the superstar posted simply “RENAISSANCEㅤ ㅤWORLD TOUR 2023.” Her website shows tour dates from May to September. Beyoncé will perform in cities around the world, making several stops in the United States.

Ticketmaster published a blog post on Wednesday with instructions on how to get tickets for the tour.

People who want access to the North American leg of the tour have to be registered as Verified Fans, the post explained.

“Demand for this tour is expected to be high,” the page said. “If there is more demand than there are tickets available, a lottery-style selection process will determine which registered Verified Fans get a unique access code and which are placed on the waitlist,” the company said, adding that the access code doesn’t guarantee a ticket.

Fans have been eagerly awaiting news of the tour, but many are already bracing themselves for a Ticketmaster disaster, following the recent Swift ticket debacle.

“Hey @Ticketmaster you better have you servers ready!!!” one person tweeted. “Don’t screw this up,” said another.

The Swift concert drama started even before tickets officially went on sale. In mid-November, Ticketmaster’s site overloaded when fans tried to purchase pre-sale tickets for just a handful of dates. Demand was so high that Ticketmaster ultimately canceled the public sale of the tickets. Swift was furious, calling the debacle “excruciating for me.”

Ticketmaster had to contend with more than just the ire of Swift and her fans. The fiasco prompted a US Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, designed to examine the lack of competition in the ticketing industry (and give senators an opportunity to quote their favorite T-Swift song lyrics.) The hearing gave members of the committee and others a chance to call out Ticketmaster’s power within the industry.

Over a decade ago, the company merged with Live Nation, despite fears that the conglomerate would create a monopoly in the ticketing sector. In 2010, a court filing that raised objections to the merger said that Ticketmaster had over 80% share among major venues. Ticketmaster disputes that market share estimate, and says it holds at most just over 30% of the concert market, according to CFO Joe Berchtold, who spoke about the business on NPR.

Today, it’s widely criticized for holding too much power in the sector — effectively barring fans and artists from buying or selling tickets through a competitor.

Renaissance, which dropped this summer, has been widely acclaimed and was nominated for album of the year at the Grammys Feb. 5.

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February 1, 2023
Ticketmaster gets grilled: 6 takeaways from hearing over Taylor Swift concert fiasco | CNN Business

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Lawmakers grilled a top executive of Ticketmaster’s parent company, Live Nation Entertainment, on Tuesday after the service’s inability to process orders for Taylor Swift’s upcoming tour left millions of people unable to buy tickets late last year.

During the three-hour hearing, senators pressed Live Nation president and CFO Joe Berchtold and some other witnesses on whether his company was too dominant in the industry, thereby harming rivals, musicians and fans.

“I want to congratulate and thank you for an absolutely stunning achievement,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal said to Berthtold. “You have brought together Republicans and Democrats in an absolutely unified cause.”

Here’s a look at the big takeaways from the hearing:

When tickets for Swift’s new five-month Eras Tour went on sale on Ticketmaster in mid November, heavy demand snarled the ticketing site, infuriating fans who couldn’t snag tickets. Unable to resolve the problems, Ticketmaster subsequently canceled Swift’s concert ticket sales to the general public, citing “extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand.”

In his testimony Tuesday, Berchtold partly blamed the Swift ticketing incident on the bots.

Ticketmaster, he said, was “hit with three times the amount of bot traffic than we had ever experienced” amid the “unprecedented demand for Taylor Swift tickets.” The bot activity “required us to slow down and even pause our sales. This is what led to a terrible consumer experience that we deeply regret.”

Berchtold also went on defense more broadly about his company. He emphasized that Ticketmaster does not set ticket prices, does not determine the number of tickets put up for sale and that “in most cases, venues set service and ticketing fees,” not Ticketmaster.

He also rejected suggestions that its dominance has allowed for soaring fees, citing data from the market intelligence firm Pollstar showing that Live Nation controls about 200 out of approximately 4,000 venues in the United States, or about 5%.

The venues controlled by Live Nation set fees that are “consistent with the other venues in the marketplace,” he said.

Members of the entertainment industry and one rival spoke out against Ticketmaster’s dominance in the industry.

Jack Groetzinger, CEO of SeatGeek, alleged that many venue owners “fear losing Live Nation concerts if they don’t use Ticketmaster” and its services, and argued the company must be broken up.

“Live Nation controls the most popular entertainers in the world, routes most of the large tours, operates the ticketing systems and even owns many of the venues,” he told lawmakers. “This power over the entire live entertainment industry allows Live Nation to maintain its monopolistic influence over the primary ticketing market.”

He continued: “As long as Live Nation remains both the dominant concert promoter and ticketer of major venues in the US, the industry will continue to lack competition and struggle,” he said.

Clyde Lawrence, a singer-songwriter on the witness panel, explained how the company acts as a promoter, a venue and the ticketing company, which eats into performing artists’ revenues. Artists, he said, have no leverage over Live Nation.

“Since both our pay and theirs is a share of the show’s profits, we should be true partners aligned in our incentives — keep costs low while ensuring the best fan experience,” he said. “But with Live Nation not only acting as the promoter but also the owner and operator of the venue, it seriously complicates these incentives.”

Lawrence also said with Ticketmaster, “we’ll see a 40%-ish or closer to 50% fee added on top” of the base ticket price.

The fallout from the ticketing fiasco once again cast a harsh spotlight on Ticketmaster and its power in the industry, more than a decade after it completed its merger with Live Nation despite concerns the deal would create a near monopoly in the ticketing sector.

“To have a strong capitalist system, you have to have competition,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, said during her opening remarks. “You can’t have too much consolidation — something that, unfortunately for this country, as an ode to Taylor Swift, I will say, we know ‘all too well.’”

Kathleen Bradish, vice president for legal advocacy at the American Antitrust Institute, called Ticketmaster “a very traditional monopoly” and told lawmakers the lack of competition in the live entertainment industry results in consumers having to pay higher prices.

“Its dominance in markets up and down the live entertainment supply chain creates the incentive and the ability to limit competition and protect its market position,” she explained. “Customers pay the price for these monopolistic acts with higher ticket prices and fees, lower quality, less choice and less innovation.”

On the concert side, the company excludes “smaller or independent concert promoters and venues. In digital ticketing, it includes excluding ticket resellers and brokers who provide important competition via the secondary ticketing market,” she said.

Lawmakers repeatedly questioned the US government’s past handling of the Live Nation merger with Ticketmaster. It involved a legally binding consent agreement that allowed the company to merge with Ticketmaster so long as the combined company abided by a number of behavioral conditions.

A 2019 Justice Department review found that Live Nation was not meeting its commitments under the order, but instead of suing, the Department modified the agreement and extended it for another five years, according to Bradish at the American Antitrust Institute.

“DOJ should pursue new enforcement action to obtain effective structural relief,” said Bradish, calling for a breakup of Live Nation under either Section 7 of the Clayton Act or Section 2 of the Sherman Act.

Sen. Mike Lee said the way that history has unfolded since the Live Nation merger raises “very serious doubts” about the usefulness of consent agreements imposed by the federal government.

If the current Justice Department concludes that the consent decree has been violated, “unwinding the merger ought to be on the table,” Blumenthal said.

In response to Berchtold’s explanation about the bot problem, some lawmakers questioned the company’s security practices, noting many small businesses can determine when bad actors are infiltrating their systems.

Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn suggested Berchtold strengthen its cyberprotections, get better advice and hire new IT workers to better protect its systems. (Berchtold said the company has poured billions of dollars into security to protect its systems over the years.)

Another Republican, Sen. John Kennedy, went further in criticizing the company over the Swift ticketing issue. He said whoever at Live Nation was in charge of the incident “ought to be fired.”

In the back half of the hearing, some of the focus shifted to possible solutions – but there were no easy answers.

Some lawmakers focused on the ability to resell tickets. While this option can be useful for customers who need to change plans, it can also help prop up the scalping market.

When senators discussed whether restricting the ability to transfer tickets would help, Live Nation’s exec was in favor of it. But the SeatGeek CEO said this might only entrench Live Nation’s dominance, as it holds the kind of market share that would force consumers to solely transact there in the absence of other resale market options.

– CNN’s Brian Fung and Aditi Sangal contributed to this report

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January 25, 2023
A galactic merger brought a pair of supermassive black holes together | CNN

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CNN
—

Two supermassive black holes have been spotted feasting on cosmic materials as two galaxies in distant space merge — and are the closest to colliding black holes astronomers have ever observed.

Astronomers spotted the pair while using the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array of telescopes, or ALMA, in northern Chile’s Atacama Desert, to observe two merging galaxies about 500 million light-years from Earth.

The two black holes were growing in tandem near the center of the coalescing galaxy resulting from the merger. They met when their host galaxies, known as UGC 4211, collided.

One is 200 million times the mass of our sun, while the other is 125 million times the mass of our sun.

While the black holes themselves aren’t directly visible, both were surrounded by bright clusters of stars and warm, glowing gas — all of which is being tugged by the holes’ gravitational pull.

Over time, they will start circling one another in orbit, eventually crashing into one another and creating one black hole.

After observing them across multiple wavelengths of light, the black holes are located the closest together scientists have ever seen — only about 750 light-years apart, which is relatively close, astronomically speaking.

The results were shared at the 241st meeting of the American Astronomical Society being held this week in Seattle, and published Monday in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The distance between the black holes “is fairly close to the limit of what we can detect, which is why this is so exciting,” said study coauthor Chiara Mingarelli, an associate research scientist at the Flatiron Institute’s Center for Computational Astrophysics in New York City, in a statement.

Galactic mergers are more common in the distant universe, which makes them harder to see using Earth-based telescopes. But ALMA’s sensitivity was able to observe even their active galactic nuclei — the bright, compact regions in galaxies where matter swirls around black holes. Astronomers were surprised to find a binary pair of black holes, rather than a single black hole, dining on the gas and dust stirred up by the galactic merger.

“Our study has identified one of the closest pairs of black holes in a galaxy merger, and because we know that galaxy mergers are much more common in the distant Universe, these black hole binaries too may be much more common than previously thought,” said lead study author Michael Koss, a senior research scientist at the Eureka Scientific research institute in Oakland, California, in a statement.

“What we’ve just studied is a source in the very final stage of collision, so what we’re seeing presages that merger and also gives us insight into the connection between black holes merging and growing and eventually producing gravitational waves,” Koss said.

If pairs of black holes — as well as merging galaxies that lead to their creation — are more common in the universe than previously thought, they could have implications for future gravitational wave research. Gravitational waves, or ripples in space time, are created when black holes collide.

It will still take a few hundred million years for this particular pair of black holes to collide, but the insights gained from this observation could help scientists better estimate how many pairs of black holes are close to colliding in the universe.

“There might be many pairs of growing supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies that we have not been able to identify so far,” said study coauthor Ezequiel Treister, an astronomer at Universidad Católica de Chile in Santiago, Chile, in a statement. “If this is the case, in the near future we will be observing frequent gravitational wave events caused by the mergers of these objects across the Universe.”

Space-based telescopes like Hubble and the Chandra X-ray Observatory and ground-based telescopes like the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, also in the Atacama Desert, and the W.M. Keck telescope in Hawaii have also observed UGC 4211 across different wavelengths of light to provide a more detailed overview and differentiate between the two black holes.

“Each wavelength tells a different part of the story,” Treister said. “All of these data together have given us a clearer picture of how galaxies such as our own turned out to be the way they are, and what they will become in the future.”

Understanding more about the end stages of galaxy mergers could provide more insight about what will happen when our Milky Way galaxy collides with the Andromeda galaxy in about 4.5 billion years.

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January 10, 2023
Microsoft buys stake in London Stock Exchange in cloud data deal | CNN Business

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London
CNN
—

Microsoft

(MSFT) is buying a 4% stake in the London Stock Exchange as part of a deal that will see the market operator spend at least $2.8 billion over 10 years on the software provider’s cloud services.

The companies announced the partnership in a joint statement on Monday, touting the benefits it will deliver to the stock exchange’s customers through improved data and analytics. Shares of the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) gained 4% in early trade.

The partnership “creates attractive revenue growth opportunities for both companies,” LSEG CEO David Schwimmer said in the statement.

As part of the deal, the London Stock Exchange’s data platform and other technology infrastructure will migrate into Microsoft’s Azure cloud environment.

The companies also plan to work together to develop new products and services for data and analytics using Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Teams and Microsoft’s artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities.

As a start, the exchange will be able to share its data and analytics with Teams and Microsoft 365, which includes Excel and PowerPoint.

“The partnership will build on the good progress made by LSEG on the integration of Refinitiv and enhance its position as a world-leading financial markets infrastructure and data provider,” the statement said.

LSEG completed its $27 billion acquisition of Refinitiv last year, making it the second largest financial data company after Bloomberg. Its data and analytics business makes up two-thirds of group revenue.

The deal with Microsoft includes a commitment by LSEG to spend at least $2.8 billion on the software provider’s cloud-related products and services over the 10-year term of the partnership. This is consistent with existing long-term spending plans, according to the statement.

Microsoft will buy its LSEG shares from Blackstone and Thomson Reuters

(TRI). The purchase is expected to complete in the first quarter of 2023.

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December 12, 2022
One of Asia’s top female entrepreneurs is stepping down at Grab, the ride-hailing company she helped found | CNN Business

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Hong Kong
CNN
—

One of Southeast Asia’s most well-known female entrepreneurs is to step down from her operational roles at Grab, the ride-hailing giant she helped found more than a decade ago.

Tan Hooi Ling, a former chief operating officer who currently leads the firm’s technology and corporate strategy teams, will move to an advisory role by the end of the year, the company said Thursday. She will also give up her seat on the board.

Her exit leaves Grab’s Chief Executive Officer Anthony Tan the tough task of reversing years of losses amid increasingly fierce competition in the ride-hailing and food delivery markets, all without the help of the woman who helped him co-found the company in 2012.

“Grab has been one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. The impact we create is a reflection of who we are as a team, and I am humbled to have been able to walk alongside Anthony and the many amazing Grabbers who share the same values and work ethic to build something that improves lives in Southeast Asia,” a statement from the company quoted Tan Hooi Ling as saying.

After being founded as a ride-hailing company by the two Tans – who are both from Malaysia but are unrelated – Grab quickly soared to become Southeast Asia’s most valuable private company. It acquired Uber’s Southeast Asia business in 2018, and has since expanded into a variety of other services, including food delivery, digital payments and even financial services.

But Grab has faced intensifying competition from Southeast Asia rivals, including Singapore’s Sea Ltd, Indonesia’s GoTo Group, and Berlin-based Delivery Hero’s Foodpanda.

Grab, which unlike some of its competitors avoided mass layoffs during the coronavirus pandemic, posted an annual loss of $1.74 billion in 2022. That was a 51% improvement on the year before, according to its annual report.

In 2021, the company merged with a special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, backed by Altimeter Capital in a deal that would pave the way for a New York listing and value Grab at nearly $40 billion.

Before that, Grab had heavyweight backers including Japan’s SoftBank

(SFTBF) and China’s ride-hailing startup, Didi Chuxing.

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April 12, 2021
Microsoft faces off against US government over Activision deal, with top execs set to testify | CNN Business

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CNN
—

Microsoft

(MSFT) and the video game giant Activision Blizzard

(ATVI) will face off Thursday against the US government in a high-stakes battle over one of the largest technology acquisitions in history.

The showdown in federal court will have the CEOs of both companies taking the stand to defend their $69 billion merger against claims that the combination could violate US antitrust law and harm millions of consumers.

The outcome of the fight will shape the future of the multibillion-dollar games industry. It will also impact enormously popular gaming franchises such as “Call of Duty” and “World of Warcraft,” which Activision owns and would be transferred to Microsoft under the deal.

Also testifying will be the top financial executives from both companies; senior leaders from Microsoft’s Xbox division; the CEO of Microsoft Gaming, Phil Spencer; and a vocal critic of the deal, Sony gaming CEO Jim Ryan.

The days-long affair begins Thursday and is scheduled to run through next week.

In bringing the case, the Federal Trade Commission is asking a US district court judge for an injunction that would temporarily halt the deal. That would keep the companies from closing their merger, at least until the FTC’s in-house court rules in a separate proceeding on whether the acquisition is anticompetitive.

But this week’s fight over a preliminary injunction may prove decisive for the deal as a whole. Microsoft has said that a victory for the FTC at this stage “will effectively block the transaction” overall.

In this hearing, the FTC does not need to prove that the deal is anticompetitive. It just needs to show that the agency would be likely to succeed in doing so if the case moves ahead, and that otherwise its ability to enforce US antitrust law would be harmed.

The clash comes as Microsoft and Activision face down a contractual July 18 deadline to consummate the deal. Failure to close, or any permanent court order to block the merger, could force Microsoft to pay a $3 billion breakup fee to Activision, according to the deal’s terms.

The FTC lawsuit has put Microsoft under the harshest antitrust scrutiny in the US in more than two decades. It also could be a crucial test for the FTC at a time when it’s trying to rein in the tech industry broadly, with mixed success.

In its initial challenge to the merger in its in-house court last year, the FTC alleged the deal would harm competition by turning Microsoft into the world’s third-largest video game publisher — allowing it to raise video game prices with impunity, restrict Activision titles from rival platforms and harm game quality and player experiences on consoles and gaming services.

Some of those concerns have also been raised internationally. The UK government has challenged the acquisition, and the New Zealand government on Tuesday warned that the deal could be anticompetitive.

Microsoft has sought to address the concerns by hammering out multi-year licensing agreements with competitors such as Nintendo and Nvidia to ensure that their platforms will continue to receive popular titles if the deal goes through.

The company has also put forth an 11-point pledge to keep its platforms open, a commitment that applies not only to the Activision Blizzard deal but to virtually all of Microsoft’s gaming business going forward.

Last month, Microsoft said the European Union would require it to license Activision games “automatically” to competing cloud gaming services as a condition of allowing the merger to proceed in the EU. That commitment, Microsoft said, “will apply globally and will empower millions of consumers worldwide to play these games on any device they choose.”

Although EU regulators have said the concession addresses their concerns, officials in the US and the UK are continuing with their legal opposition to the deal.

The standoff particularly focuses attention on FTC Chair Lina Khan, a tech industry critic who has argued for litigating difficult cases and for introducing novel legal theories to help adapt US antitrust law to the digital age.

Khan won a significant victory last year when the FTC forced Nvidia to abandon its attempted acquisition of the chipmaker Arm. The deal would have combined two companies in adjacent industries in what is known as a vertical merger, a type of deal that is rarely blocked in the United States.

But Khan also suffered a setback when the FTC unsuccessfully tried to block Facebook-parent Meta from acquiring Within Unlimited, a virtual reality startup. The FTC had argued that the acquisition was an attempt by Meta to quash competition in the nascent VR industry, but earlier this year, a federal judge declined to issue a preliminary injunction of the kind the FTC now seeks against Microsoft. The FTC dropped its case against Meta soon after.

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April 12, 2021
Call of Duty to remain on Playstation following Activision Blizzard Microsoft merger | CNN Business

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CNN
—

Microsoft

(MSFT) has signed an agreement with Sony

(SNE) to ensure “Call of Duty” remains available on PlayStation after Microsoft

(MSFT) closes its $69 billion Activision Blizzard

(ATVI) merger, the tech giant said Sunday.

The agreement could resolve long-standing complaints by Sony that the merger — which aims to make Microsoft the third-largest video game publisher in the world — threatens competition. Sony didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We are pleased to announce that Microsoft and @PlayStation have signed a binding agreement to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation following the acquisition of Activision Blizzard,” said Phil Spencer, Microsoft’s Xbox head, in a tweet. “We look forward to a future where players globally have more choice to play their favorite games.”

Sony had been among the loudest critics of the acquisition. Addressing the company’s concerns about the continued availability of “Call of Duty,” one of the industry’s most popular franchises, could help Microsoft overcome any remaining opposition to the deal and usher it to a conclusion.

In response to competition concerns from regulators around the world, Microsoft had already signed multiyear licensing agreements with rival companies including Nintendo and Nvidia, among others, to ensure Microsoft would not be able to restrict Activision titles from users of those businesses’ platforms and consoles.

On Sunday, Microsoft did not disclose the duration of the agreement with Sony.

“From Day One of this acquisition, we’ve been committed to addressing the concerns of regulators, platform and game developers, and consumers,” said Microsoft President Brad Smith in a tweet. “Even after we cross the finish line for this deal’s approval, we will remain focused on ensuring that Call of Duty remains available on more platforms and for more consumers than ever before.”

During a five-day hearing last month in federal court, Microsoft executives including CEO Satya Nadella testified properties such as “Call of Duty” would not be restricted from competitors following the deal’s close.

Last week, US District Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley wrote in her opinion the US government had “not shown it is likely to succeed on its assertion the combined firm will probably pull Call of Duty from Sony PlayStation, or that its ownership of Activision content will substantially lessen competition in the video game library subscription and cloud gaming markets.”

Microsoft faces a contractual deadline of July 18 to close the merger with Activision, though the companies could mutually seek to extend that time frame.

Last week, Microsoft won two successive court victories when a federal district court and a US appeals court declined to temporarily block the merger from being consummated. The Federal Trade Commission had argued a preliminary injunction was necessary to prevent video game consumers from being immediately harmed by the deal, which regulators said would enable Microsoft to withhold “Call of Duty” and other popular titles from competing consoles and cloud gaming services.

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April 12, 2021
Microsoft and Activision extend their deal deadline | CNN Business

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Washington
CNN
—

Microsoft and Activision have mutually agreed to extend their merger deadline by three months in the face of ongoing negotiations with the UK government that could allow the $69 billion acquisition to close, the two companies announced on Wednesday.

The announcement highlights the commitment by both companies to complete the deal after back-to-back court defeats for US regulators who had challenged the merger.

The new contractual deadline for consummating the deal will be October 18, the companies said. The previous deadline was July 18.

“Together with @Activision, we are announcing the extension of our merger agreement to 10/18 to provide ample time to work through the final regulatory issues,” Brad Smith, Microsoft’s vice chair and president, said in a Twitter post on Wednesday.

If the companies fail to close by Aug. 29, Microsoft could be asked to pay a breakup fee of $3.5 billion, an increase of $500 million over the previously agreed-upon sum, according to a filing from Activision with the Securities and Exchange Commission. If the deal fails to close by Sept. 15, the breakup fee could increase to $4.5 billion, the filing said.

In addition, according to the filing, if the companies fail to complete their merger and Microsoft is forced to pay the breakup fee, the companies also agreed that beginning on Oct. 18 Microsoft would have to pay Activision “100% of all proceeds or other payments for games” that belong to Activision.

Following a federal judge’s decision last week in the US not to block the acquisition from closing, Microsoft announced a deal with the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to suspend litigation over the merger. The move is intended to give both sides time to reach agreement on how the acquisition might be altered to address competition concerns in that country.

“The recent decision in the U.S. and approvals in 40 countries all validate that the deal is good for competition, players, and the future of gaming,” a company spokesperson said. “Given global regulatory approvals and the companies’ confidence that CMA now recognizes there are remedies available to meet their concerns in the UK, the Activision Blizzard and Microsoft boards of directors have authorized the companies not to terminate the deal until after October 18. We’re confident in our next steps and that our deal will quickly close.”

In a memo to employees, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick thanked staff for their patience.

“I know many of you have questions about our merger with Microsoft,” Kotick wrote. “I am happy to share that based on our continued confidence in closing our deal, the Activision Blizzard and Microsoft boards have mutually agreed not to terminate the deal until after October 18.”

Kotick added: “This merger is great for players, workers, and our business, and it will create opportunities to compete against companies with large talent pools, strong IP and complete control of their markets. Our merger is cleared to close in over 40 countries already, and we remain confident in resolving any remaining regulatory concerns in the UK.”

In a memo to employees, Microsoft’s Xbox head Phil Spencer reiterated his hopes of bringing “more games to more players everywhere.”

“While we can technically close in the United States due to recent legal developments, this extension gives us additional time to resolve the remaining regulatory concerns in the UK,” Spencer wrote in his email.

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April 12, 2021