Airtel and tata play merger with Bharti Airtel DTH business?

Bharti Airtel is in talks to merge its struggling DTH business, Airtel Digital TV with Tata Play in a share swap deal, according to a report.

According to the report, Airtel will own more than 50% of the merged company. Tata Play, previously known as Tata Sky, was originally a JV with Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. The Walt Disney Company later acquired that stake when it took over Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox in 2019. The deal is expected to help Airtel grow its broadband and entertainment business by bundling telecom, broadband, and DTH services. If the merger goes through it will also be the biggest in India’s DTH sector since Dish TV’s merger with Videocon d2h in 2016.

The deal also comes at a time when Reliance Industries and Walt Disney are combining Star India and Viacom18 to form JioStar, India’s largest media and entertainment company, with an estimated revenue of Rs 26,000 crore in FY24.
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Both companies are expected to announce a preliminary agreement in the coming days, after which the due diligence process will begin as per the report. Airtel Digital TV, housed under Bharti Telemedia, will gain access to Tata Play’s 19 million homes and half a million broadband customers. The combined entity had 35 million paid subscribers and FY24 revenues exceeding Rs 7,000 crore. 

Source: AM