A public hearing into Bell‘s $3.4-billion acquisition of Astral Media got underway this morning in Montreal.
The CRTC hearing will focus on how much of the English-language TV market the telecom giant will corner if the deal were to go through.
The commission will examine the multibillion-dollar transaction and hear from multimedia, telecom and radio companies, and producers as well as film groups and consumer advocates – many of them against the deal.
Bell’s parent company BCE said if the deal is approved it will own 33.5% of the English-language market.
That’s under the 35% threshold set by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission for approval.
However, competitors of BCE disagree with the way calculates market share and argue it would get too much clout.
The “Just Say No To Bell” campaign’s website run by says if the deal is successful, Bell would control 37.6% of TV viewing. It wants the federal government to stop the deal.
Telus Corp., for one, argues Bell would have too much control of English-language TV content and leave consumers with fewer choices and higher cable bills.
Related
• Telus weighs in on Bell’s proposed deal for Astral
• Cable companies try to stop Bell-Astral deal
Telus has argued that the purchase of Montreal-based Astral, along with Bell’s part ownership in the Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment TV assets, and its stake in joint venture assets, such as Teletoon, would give Bell 49.5% share of the English-language television audience.
A coalition comprised of Quebecor, Cogeco and Eastlink have also been fighting to stop the Astral takeover.
BCE announced the Astral deal last March aimed at creating a media powerhouse poised to take on rivals in providing digital content to consumers. At the time of the deal, BCE chief executive George Cope had said the deal gives Bell important new content for online services and mobile devices like smartphones and tablet computers.
In 2010, BCE bought the rest of the CTV assets it didn’t already own for $1.3 billion.
CTV operates more than 25 stations across the country, 30 specialty channels including sports networks TSN and RDS online video programming and properties such as CTV.ca, TSN.ca, RDS.ca, MuchMusic.com, MTV.ca and TheComedyNetwork.ca. It also owns CHUM Radio, which operates more than 30 radio stations throughout Canada.
Astral is Canada’s largest pay and specialty TV broadcaster and owns 84 radio stations in 50 Canadian markets and 24 television services. It is also the third-largest outdoor advertising company and has a stake in the country’s only subscription radio service, XM-Sirius Canada.
If the deal goes ahead, Bell said it would control 24.4% of the French-language market. Bell has said the acquisition of the Astral media assets will provide more competition in Quebec’s French-language market which is dominated by Quebecor Inc.
