10 Reasons Why Disney's Fox Takeover Is Terrifying
5. They Now Control Sky
Fox’s 39.14% ownership of Sky effectively gave them control of the company as they were the majority shareholder, and since their stake was one of the things offered up for sale, that statistic now applies to Disney. Which is more worrying than you might think.
Sky not only operates a TV news channel available to the entirety of the UK on Freeview, but has telecoms, broadband, and television operations across Europe and Australia, as well as streaming service NowTV. Elsewhere, the company’s other ventures that now fall under Disney’s control include Amstrad, 70% of Love Productions – producers of The Great British Bake Off – 40% of Nickelodeon UK, and Wi-Fi provider The Cloud.
This is already a scary amount of power for one parent company to wield, but the real concern is what happens next. Until recently, Fox were looking to acquire the remaining 61% of Sky but faced pushback from UK regulator Ofcom, largely over concerns about the Murdoch’s family’s influence over UK news because of their other business holdings like newspapers. But Disney didn’t buy any of those businesses.
With these areas of the Murdoch empire now separated, Disney is reviving the plan to own 100% of Sky. And with the main point of concern for regulators no longer being a factor, it’s looking increasingly likely that they’ll get it.