Australian media mogul Bruce Gordon has seen his appeal over the proposed takeover of commercial broadcaster Ten by US mass media company CBS rejected by the New South Wales Supreme Court.
The Australian newspaper said Gordon will now take the matter to the Court of Appeal ahead of a creditors meeting on the takeover that is scheduled for tomorrow (Tuesday).
CBS last month agreed a deal to acquire embattled Ten, which entered into voluntary administration in June. Ten is one of the main sports broadcasters in Australia and in addition to its core linear channel, CBS is set to acquire digital terrestrial television channel Eleven, which it already owns a 33 per cent stake in, the DTT channel One and Ten’s digital platform, TenPlay.
CBS struck the deal with Ten’s receivers and managers, PPB Advisory, as well as administrator KordaMentha Restructuring. However, Gordon and fellow media mogul Lachlan Murdoch have challenged the offer and on Friday submitted a new bid to take over Ten.
Murdoch and Gordon’s investment vehicles, Illyria and Birketu, submitted the offer of A$55m (€37m/$44m) to KordaMentha after the Australian Senate passed changes to media laws that would have previously blocked a takeover of Ten by the duo. In the proposal, the executives said that the bid outlined a “single implementation path” and “lower transaction risk” than a previous offer they had submitted for A$35m.
Today’s (Monday’s) Supreme Court ruling saw Gordon claim that KordaMentha failed to provide adequate information about his joint bid for Ten with Murdoch.
However, Justice Ashley Black ruled: “In summary, I am not satisfied that the plaintiffs have established that any deficiencies in the section 439A report, as supplemented by the supplementary report, are such as to warrant orders requiring that further information be provided to creditors or that the second creditors’ meeting be restrained.”
The Australian said administrator Mark Korda will now present the rival Gordon/Murdoch and CBS bids to tomorrow’s meeting leaving it for creditors to decide what to do.
Korda said: “The creditors can do two things. They can either adjourn the meeting or vote on the CBS proposal. It’s up to the creditors, not me.”
Ten’s last major sports-rights deal came in June as it acquired rights to the A-League, the top tier of domestic football, as well as matches played by the men’s national team.