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Disney bought Fox: Fox Shareholders Agreed to $71B Disney Buyout!!
BlackNMild2k1:
and once again, the Simpsons called it....
Announcement expected on Thursday
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/12/fox-disney-on-glide-path-for-thursday-deal-announcement-sources.html
But it appears Disney is practically done hammering out the details with FOX over an acquisition of a majority of it's Movie, TV assets and all their Regional Sports channels.
This deal DOES NOT include: FOX News, FOX Sports 1 or 2, nor their National Broadcast station FOX (ch2 around here)
From what I've read they will be acquiring the following:
- 21st Century Fox (IP holders of The Simpsons, Aliens, Predator, X-Men (& F4?), and distribution for Avatar and A New Hope, among MANY, MANY other shows an movies)
- FX/FXX cable channels
- National Geographic Channel
- All Regional Sports Channels (i.e. Fox Sports Boston, Fox Sports Detroit)
- An additional 30% stake in HULU (increasing Disney's share up to 60%)
- 40% Stake in SkyTV (big deal over in Europe) with the bid to also take full 100% control
-there's another Euro/Aus company caught up in the deal... I'll have to edit it in later if it comes to me
- And all of FOX's debts
The entire deal was speculated to be worth about $60 Billion
and would be mostly completed through a stock trade which would give the Murdochs roughly about 5% of Disney while all the 21st Century Fox stock holders would trade out the remainder of their stock which I think including the Murdochs share was roughly 25% of Disney stock
I don't know how much of all that any of you care about, but this means that potentially Disney has just brought home the X-Men (& Deadpool) along with the Fantastic Four for Marvel Studios to play with.
Some may be worried that some of the upcoming X-Men movies might be cancelled or that we may never see some of them since they are rated R, but it's also reported that 21 Century Film/TV will remain autonomous like Marvel and Lucasfilm and Pixar, so they could still be releasing TV shows and movies under the 21st Century banner that Disney doesn't want directly under their own.
So we could still get the sequel to Logan, and a Deadpool 3 and a follow up to New Mutants, and maybe X-Force and all that depending on how Marvel Studios wants to handle the X-Men going forward past projects already in production (such as Dark Phoenix, which is supposedly taking place around the same time in history and also using Skrulls like the movie Captain Marvel)
this deal also gives Disney back the Star Wars: A New Hope (ep4) which could mean new OT untouched at some point, assuming it still exist. I know some SW fans will love that.
It also gives Disney distribution with Cameron directly for Avatar 2, 3, and 4 which pairs perfectly with their major investment in Avatar Land and Animal Kingdom.
Another interesting aspect of this whole deal is that Comcast was also seriously interesting in this deal for themselves, but the Murdochs never really entertained their offer. What's interesting about that is that Comcast owns NBC and Universal, who has the distribution right to The Hulk and I think Namor.
But that's not all, Universal is also the owner of Universal Studios, who has exclusive rights to Marvel characters in theme parks East of the Mississippi, meaning NO MARVEL at Disney World.
With all this newly acquired IP, maybe Comcast will finally make a deal with Disney so that Disney can get their rights back and make Marvel whole again.
I have no idea what Comcast would likely trade for, or what Disney would be willing to give up in exchange, but there plenty to deal with here.... and not just for Comcast, but for Sony who has Spider-Man rights, and to Paramount who holds rights to Indiana Jones.
Some of you may wonder what exactly is Disney supposed to do with all these Fox Properties, and what is gonna happen to my favorite shows that happen to com on FOX?
Well I imagine since FOX is keeping the FOX channel, all those same shows will still air on there, and 21 Century will continue to operate as normal (outside of maybe losing control of a few properties that belong to Marvel).
There could be a nice shake up in who is heading all of TV as ABC hasn't been doing the best, but the guy that runs FX/FXX might be a difference maker.
and as far as what happens with all these shows? Well don't forget that Disney is making their own competitor to Netflix, and they will also by 60% majority stake holders in HULU, so whatever doesn't fit on the former (fam-friendly) will likely end up on the other.
What do you guys think about this deal happening?
p.s. I didn't even mention the fact that all that sports stuff is gonna make Disney a MAJOR provider of sports going forwards since all of that will get rebranded as ESPN stuff
So this deal is pretty huge for Marvel, Lucasfilm, ESPN, possibly ABC as well as Disney as a whole.
p.s.s - and I didn't mention the comics and gaming side for Marvel at all....
Now Marvel can drop it's ban on Fantastic Four comics and creating NEW mutants for X-Men
this will also allow merchandising dept to start producing X-Men and F4 toys (X-Men Hot Toys could look dope)
and now all those Marvel games will be able to use X-Men and F4 characters again.
- so whenever Capcom decides to bring MvC:I over to the Switch, I expect a FULL roster of characters.
broodwars:
It won't be, but this acquisition should be blocked. There's already way too much of the entertainment market concentrated at Disney without adding Fox to it. We're getting close to an entertainment monopoly.
lolmonade:
--- Quote from: broodwars on December 12, 2017, 01:31:31 PM ---It won't be, but this acquisition should be blocked. There's already way too much of the entertainment market concentrated at Disney without adding Fox to it. We're getting close to an entertainment monopoly.
--- End quote ---
Seconded. I understand how badly people want the unification of all these properties that used to share the same universe, but with how Disney is already prone to strong-arm theaters to get the terms they want, i'm not sure I see good things coming out of this buy-out.
I've already made my comments on how I suspect Disney would affect the tone and nature of things like Logan and Deadpool already in the Marvel thread.
I also kind of think in terms of X-men, they might have missed the big opportunity with Wolverine crossed-over into other movies? I mean, obviously they are going to re-cast that character at some point, but Hugh Jacked-Man I still associate with the character too much, personally.
BlackNMild2k1:
This sale was either happening for Disney or for Comcast, not because they forced Fox to consider a sale, but because Fox wanted to sell so they could focus on other things.
I'd much rather Disney get it for many reasons.
and this is just one tool for Disney to stay relevant in the long term, considering the war chest of potential rivals in Google, Amazon, Apple and Netflix, not to mention the threat they already have from potential bullies like Comcast (net neutrality) and the Time Warner/AT&T merger.
I can see the arguments for the negatives, but looking at the big picture and knowing FOX was selling regardless, I think Disney was the better outcome here. At least we know they are making previous acquisitions closer to whole again, and as far as the movie side of things, we should get quality out of those products.
I think the last thing any of us wanted was Comcast extending it's reach and not only controlling the content, but the access to it as well. This deal would have also put their hand in the European and Australian pies. Unfortunately for them, The Murdochs weren't interested in Comcast's stocks/money.
I am curious what Disney is gonna do with the Simpsons though... is that something they could trade or continue to lease to Universal in exchange for release of some distribution rights?
Universal Studios I believe has a Simpsons Land or something, but Disney would really like it's Marvel rights back.
lolmonade:
--- Quote from: BlackNMild2k1 on December 12, 2017, 02:01:53 PM ---This sale was either happening for Disney or for Comcast, not because they forced Fox to consider a sale, but because Fox wanted to sell so they could focus on other things.
--- End quote ---
To be fair, I really don't want Fox getting bought by either.
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