Breaking Down AT&T Vs. DOJ Ruling

The decision to allow AT&T to buy Time Warner has opened the mega merger floodgates. Comcast has formally announced a bid for much of Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox. The long awaited bid came exactly 24 hours after a federal judge sided with AT&T in its anti-trust trial with the federal government, which had sued to block the deal. The move is expected to usher in a wave of big mergers as companies look for new ways to combine. As for Comcast, which is necn’s parent company, it’s looking to add more content to its airwaves—content it owns. In this case, Comcast would acquire Fox’s movie and television studios and some other assets. The bid, worth $65-billion, is $13-billion more than what Walt Disney offered Fox for the same assets. Disney, Comcast and all the legacy media groups are scrambling to scoop up content in a rapidly changing landscape where fewer people are channel surfing, opting instead of streaming services. What are the implications of AT&T winning its trial, and what should we expect from the world of mega mergers? Attorney Dusty Hecker, partner with the Boston-based Posternak Blankstein & Lund, joins necn’s Brian Burnell to discuss.