back to article AT&T gets clearance to devour Time Warner for $85 BEEEELION

A US District Court judge has given the all-clear for AT&T's $85bn acquisition of broadcast giant Time Warner. In a ruling issued Tuesday afternoon, Judge Richard Leon said the US government's Department of Justice – which opposes the takeover – had failed to show how the combined TV and telco giants would substantially harm …

  1. Mark 85
    Facepalm

    Simple answer went right by the judge..

    In a ruling issued Tuesday afternoon, Judge Richard Leon said that the DOJ had failed to show how the combined tv and telco giants would substantially harm competition in the US market.

    There is no competition in the US market thus, no harm could be done. See icon.

    1. ecofeco Silver badge

      Re: Simple answer went right by the judge..

      Came to say basically the same thing.

      Here are the charts.

      http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36743.htm

      1. strum

        Re: Simple answer went right by the judge..

        learer graphic here:-

        https://www.recode.net/2018/1/23/16905844/media-landscape-verizon-amazon-comcast-disney-fox-relationships-chart

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Simple answer went right by the judge..

      I wonder how much that ruling cost AT&T and was it included in $85 billion? American 'justice' the best money can buy.

    3. BillG
      Joke

      Re: Simple answer went right by the judge..

      According to Judge Richard Leon: "this vertical merger would result in hundreds of millions of dollars in annual cost savings to AT&T’s customers and notwithstanding the fact that…no competitor will be eliminated by the merger proposed vertical integration."

      See??? AT&T will have reduced costs! And naturally they will want to pass those saving onto customers by lowering prices!! And then they will send their customers free candy and live unicorns!!!

    4. Alphebatical

      Re: Simple answer went right by the judge..

      Time Warner doesn't compete in the telecom business(Time Warner Cable was spun off in 2009) and, last I checked, AT&T doesn't produce any content. The only way AT&T could reduce competition is if they found a way to use Time Warner as a bludgeon.

  2. Waseem Alkurdi

    Wasn't ...

    ... AOL-Time Warner once billed to be the worst merger of all time?

    1. GrumpyOldBloke

      Re: Wasn't ...

      And yet here is the bride again looking lovely in off-white with aging husband number two. A telco that thinks owing a media company will bring the customers flocking. Two lonely hearts whose only cultural fit is that they both remember the good times. AT&T's logo looks a bit like the little blue pill so I am sure the old boy has one last ye-haa left in hm before the hairpiece slips off, the glasses fog up, his back gives out and his shareholder offspring wonder where the inheritance went.

  3. TheVogon

    "Had failed to show how the combined tv and telco giants would substantially harm competition in the US market."

    Presumably because there isn't any to harm.

  4. tip pc Silver badge
    Gimp

    Wasn’t this in Star Wars where the empire got too big for its own boots?

    Icon -> c3po

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Will the new company be called TWATT?

    1. gregthecanuck
      Gimp

      New company name

      I'm thinking Zorg Industries...

  6. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Holmes

    Looks like the bubble is ready to burst like an oversized zit

    "Money" is cheap and desperately looking for ROI emerging from the mind of a green consultant.

    The Forever War is maybe gonna end. Economic reasons, crash of Athens and all that.

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