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Bell Globemedia Buying Chum

Posted by Sookie / July 12, 2006

12 Comments

chum%20building%20468.jpgThis morning, news broke that media giant Bell Globemedia - who runs CTV, TSN, MTV, ROB and Discovery Channel - is in final talks to buy its competitor CHUM, currently valued at $903 million. CHUM's assets include 33 radio stations, 12 local TV stations and specialty channels MuchMusic, Space and Bravo. The deal will face intense scrutiny from the CRTC.

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jerrold / July 12, 2006 at 01:29 pm
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Wow. That would be one major conglomerate. Not good.
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Sameer Vasta / July 12, 2006 at 01:46 pm
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There's no way the deal as it stands will pass. When Cineplex bought Famous Players off of Viacom, the monopoly laws in our country made sure they sold a good chunk of the theatres to other companies. If the deal goes through as is, Bell Globemdia will have a stranglehold on Canadian television, something the CRTC will do everything to avoid.
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Sameer Vasta / July 12, 2006 at 01:48 pm
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By the way, is there a problem with TypeKey authorization right now? I can't seem to sign in, but that could be because I'm here at work.

(Sorry, I know that's fully unrelated.)
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Michael / July 12, 2006 at 01:51 pm
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I would think the whole MTV/MuchMusic thing would be an issue. Just as it was when CHUM bought Craig.
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Chester Pape / July 12, 2006 at 02:03 pm
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Yes they will definately have to break up and sell off some of CHUM. If I had to guess I predict that Bell will absorb most or all of the specialty cable channels and spit the broadcast TV mini-network back out. As licensed there is actually no overlap between MM and MTV Canada. The only issue would be there is so much cross-pollination between some of the specialty channels and the broadcast channels that that is easier said than done.
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anon / July 12, 2006 at 03:28 pm
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They'll keep the radio and the specialities... sell off the rest.
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Steveo / July 13, 2006 at 05:28 am
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Another conglomerate - great just what we need in a country of 30 million....
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sookie / July 13, 2006 at 10:38 am
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More news: Bell Globemedia has offered CDN $1.7 billion for all of CHUM's assets.
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jerrold / July 13, 2006 at 11:50 am
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Did you see the TV footage on CBC? I watched "Canada Now" and they showed CityTV Vancouver employees accompanied by security guards (that looked more like nightclub bouncers) handing over keys, equipment etc.
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William / July 15, 2006 at 07:00 pm
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I like the idea of this. Though I like MuchMusic a whole lot, I also like MTV and since Much is almost 25 years old and MTV has been on for barely 4 months, my proposed idea is as follows:
-Combine Much and MTV but rebrand it as MTV only.
-Instead of putting MuchMusic's VJs out of work, bring them to MTV (or at least Matte Babel, Leah Miller, and Tim Deegan- the other ones aren't very popular or interesting)
- Use Much's license to bring music videos to MTV. Maybe change MTV Live to be more like TRL or MuchOnDemand, but use Much's VJs as well as some mtv personalities for the music stuff (see how it all works out)
-The other issues of the deal I couldn't care less about.
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sookie / July 23, 2006 at 12:36 pm
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I think the Much brand (as old as it is) may soon have more global clout than MTV's. I hope they keep it.
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anastassia / August 8, 2006 at 02:47 am
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i don't like the idea at all. Soon we're gonna have only 1 media giant. Makes you wonder...
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