NBC is in play. GE wants to get rid of it.
Now that The Financial Times is on top of this story, everyone across country--from TV execs, to fee-hungry Wall Streeters, to humble viewers, such as yours truly--is going to be buzzing about the impending spinooff. It'll be a great story for FBN, even if, I am willing to predict, CNBC doesn't pay it too much mind!
The Cable Gamer has been on this story since July, because even she could figure out that GE's ownership of NBC was an artifact of a different time in American corporate history. And so now it makes sense to break open the conglomerate first founded by Thomas Edison, especially when some familiar sub-units of GE/NBC have violated the legendary Jack Welch's fundamental rule of management: If a GE operating division can't be first or second in its field, then get out of that field.
And closer to TCG's area of expertise, she knew darn well that MSNBC and CNBC were not being well run. How could those little networks be well managed from GE HQ in Fairfield, CT? No offense to Jeff Immelt, but what does he know about TV? He's a plastics guy! Nothing wrong with plastic, of course, or finance, or business, but TV is its own unique industry--that's why ex-GE-er Bob Wright made such a fool of himself before he was shuffled off to golden-parachuted retirement, he didn't know squat about TV, and yet he thought that he did.
(As as aside, much to the embittered bemusement of his underlings, Wright in his heyday was famous for not being able to understand the pitches of producers. That is, they would explain the "high concept" of their show or game show to Wright, and then they would have to explain it, and explain it, and explain it. And then, time would be up, Wright would be off to his Next Important Meeting, with no decision being made. And so the show would go elsewhere, along with, of course, its ratings.)
Microsoft got suckered into MSNBC deal,but then bailed, leaving GE/NBC to pick up the continuing tab for that #3 turkey. But eventually, Welch's Wisdom--be #1 or #2 or nothing!--has begun to reassert itself. Close observers have been sensing this for months, which is why GE stock has been rising.
And now, this big story in The Financial Times offering a deeply sourced story--three reporters, Francesco Guerrera, Joshua Chaffin and Aline Van Duyn sharing the byline--detailing General Electric's plans for NBC. Here, in their own words:
NBC...has been the subject of repeated sale rumours because of its lagging performance and the awkward fit with the rest of GE’s industrial and financial businesses.
OK, but here's the punchline:
People close to the situation say that Jeffrey Immelt, GE’s chairman and chief executive, will not consider the future of GE’s 80 per cent stake in NBC – which had sales of $16.2bn and profits of $2.9bn last year – before the Olympics.
Now the FT is a careful, cautious, and sober-minded newspaper. But The Cable Gamer, with a little help from her friends--thanks, DWS!--can translate this verbiage, because this story, complete with the date-linkage of "after the Olympics" is dyn-o-mite.
The FT story means, at minimum, that GE is going to seek out suitors for NBC, with the proposed price of around $40 billion.
And that will bring out the raiders, private-equity-ers and would-be media moguls, all circling around NBC. No doubt Jeff Zucker will try to pull together his own takeover team, to save his job-- and it's possible that Zucker can sucker some "greater fool" into buying the company, with Zucker still at the helm.
But it's hard to imagine that even that great of a greater fool would keep CNBC and MSNBC as they are, especially when MSNBC has chosen to antagonize so much of Middle America with its Bush-bashing, and when CNBC is destined to get buried further by FBN. And so TCG's headline: If Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, and Dan Abrams want to continue getting paid, they will have to get their moolah directly from the Democratic National Committee. Because GE shareholders are tired of being a slush fund for lefty politics.
