Discovery Communications will buy Scripps Networks for close to $12 billion, tying together two powerful stables of TV shows ranging from Animal Planet to the Food Network.
The deal, announced Monday, puts the combined company in a stronger position to draw more women viewers and to navigate an increasingly chaotic entertainment landscape, where cable companies and streaming services like Netflix and Hulu fight for eyes.
Discovery owns TLC and the Discovery Channel. Scripps owns HGTV and the Travel Channel, among others. The combined company will house five of the top pay TV networks for women and account for more than 20 percent share of women watching prime-time pay TV in the U.S.
By combining the content of each company, Discovery has more power to create "skinny bundle" options for viewers, which offer fewer channels and are cheaper for people unwilling to shell out for a big, monthly cable bill.
The companies on Monday said they will produce approximately 8,000 hours of original programming each year, and possess 300,000 hours of library content. They have the potential to generate 7 billion short-form video streams monthly, according to Discovery.
The transaction is valued at $90 per share, about a 4 percent premium to Scripps' Friday closing price of $86.91. The per-share price includes $63 per share in cash and $27 per share in Discovery's Class C shares. The transaction also includes approximately $2.7 billion in Scripps' debt.
The companies said Monday that they expect about $350 million in cost savings.
The buyout, which still needs approval from the shareholders of both companies, is targeted to close by early next year.
Shares of Discovery Communications Inc., based in Silver Spring, Maryland, rose 2.6 percent before the market opened. Shares of Scripps Networks Interactive Inc., based in Knoxville, Tennessee, edged up slightly.
Apple sells $46 billion worth of iPhones over the summer as AI helps end slump
Apple snapped out of a recent iPhone sales slump during its summer quarter, an early sign that its recent efforts to revive demand for its marquee product with an infusion of artificial intelligence are paying off.
Sales of the iPhone totaled $46.22 billion for the July-September period, a 6% increase from the same time last year, according to Apple's fiscal fourth-quarter report released Thursday. That improvement reversed two consecutive year-over-year declines in the iPhone's quarterly sales.
The iPhone boost helped Apple deliver total quarterly revenue and profit that exceeded the analyst projections that sway investors, excluding a one-time charge of $10.2 billion to account for a recent European Union court decision that lumped the Cupertino, California, company with a huge bill for back taxes.
Apple earned $14.74 billion, or 97 cents per share, a 36% decrease from the same time last year. If not for the one-time tax hit, Apple said it would have earned $1.64 per share — topping the $1.60 per share predicted by analysts, according to FactSet Research. Revenue rose 6% from last year to $94.93 billion, about $400 million more than analysts forecast.
But investors evidently were hoping for an even better quarter and appeared disappointed by an Apple forecast that implied its revenue for the October-December quarter covering the holiday shopping season might not grow as robustly as analysts envisioned. Apple's stock price shed about 2% in Thursday's extended trading, leaving the shares hovering around $221 — well below their peak of about $237 reached in mid-October.
The latest quarterly results captured the first few days that consumers were able to buy a new iPhone 16 line-up that included four different models designed... Read More