Media moguls Rupert Murdoch and Jonathan Harmsworth, who respectively own News Corp. and the Daily Mail, have reportedly held talks about a potential partnership with the Abu Dhabi-backed fund Rebird IMI in its bid to buy the Telegraph Media Group (TMG).
A consortium of News Corp, Daily Mail General Trust (DMGT) and Redbird IMI may alleviate concerns among British policymakers and politicians over the foreign takeover of TMG, according to anonymous sources cited by Bloomberg.
The arrangement would entail Redbird IMI, a media investment fund backed by a member of the UAE royal family, holding a reduced stake in TMG, possibly as low as 25 per cent.
One of the insiders said Redbird IMI is still pursuing an outright ownership of the media group, which includes The Daily Telegraph, The Sunday Telegraph and The Spectator.
Hedge fund manager Paul Marshall, co-founder of Marshall Wace, may find himself sidelined from the joint proposition the sources said. Marshall declined to comment to Bloomberg.
But any involvement of Murdoch and Harmsworth could raise fresh concerns over competition in the UK media market.
DMGT, News UK and RedBird IMI declined to comment.
TMG was put up for sale last year after the Barclay family failed to pay back £1.6bn worth of debt it owned to lender Lloyds Bank.
This triggered an auction for the right-leaning papers, which attracted a number of potential suitors including DMGT, Murdoch and Marshall.
But Redbird IMI cleared the Barclay debts in full, paving the way for its takeover of TMG. This move sparked an outcry from MPs, who argue that
An investigation into the potential impacts of a foreign takeover of one of Britain’s biggest media groups on public interest remains ongoing.
Yesterday, Britain’s competition watchdog and Ofcom handed their own probes into the £600m deal to media secretary Lucy Frazer, who holds the authority to veto the deal if deemed necessary.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is poised to make a decision in the coming days on whether the government will propose an amendment to legislation in parliament, aimed at making it harder for foreign states to take commercial interests in the British media industry.