Hancock’s intention not to send Comcast’s Sky bid for review “perfectly rational,” says Steven Barnett

In an interview with Bloomberg, Prof. Steven Barnett has described  Culture Secretary Matt Hancock’s intention not to send Comcast’s Sky bid for review, is “perfectly rational,”. His comments come in response to news that the U.K. government intends to allow Comcast Corp’s 22 billion-pound ($30 billion) bid for Sky Plc to move ahead, a boost for the U.S. cable giant as it vies with 21st Century Fox Inc. for Britain’s largest pay-TV company. Comcast’s offer for Sky doesn’t trigger public-interest concerns that would meet the threshold for intervention, Culture Secretary Matt Hancock said in a statement. A sentiment echoed by Barnett, who suggested that ‘given that there are no newspaper holdings at all for Comcast, it always seemed unlikely there would be any public interest issue”.

The full report from Bloomberg, by Joe Mayes, can be found on their website.

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