Dec 15, 2016
The Murdochs return: How Fox ran Sky to earth
On the end of the line was James Murdoch, calling with the backing of his father Rupert, the media mogul who controls the broadcasting and newspapers businesses of 21st Century Foxand News Corp. James wanted Mr Gilbert, who serves as vice-chairman of Sky, the pan-European pay-TV operator, to stop by the midtown Manhattan skyscraper that is home to the Murdoch family's empire. James, after all, is chairman of Sky and a steward for the 39 per cent of the company which Fox has held since its last attempt to take full control of the UK-based broadcaster in 2010. On Thursday, just two weeks later, Fox unveiled a friendly £11.7bn deal for the remainder of Sky it does not own. Sky had always appeared to be unfinished business for the Murdochs, which meant that the broadcaster had formulated weeks in advance a view on what the fair value of any deal should be. Concerns were exacerbated in June when the UK - Sky's largest market - voted to exit the EU. The outcome - which Rupert Murdoch advocated vocally - sent shares in Sky tumbling and sharply weakened the value of sterling, much to the advantage of Fox, which would pay for any deal in dollars.
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