LA, Dec. 15 (TNS): Walt Disney has agreed to buy 21st Century Fox’s entertainment assets for a total $52.4bn (£39bn).
The deal includes Fox’s 39% stake in satellite broadcaster Sky, and the 20th Century Fox film studio, Disney announced.
Much of Fox’s remaining assets, including Fox News and Sports, will form a new company.
The deal ends more than half a century of media expansion by Fox owner Rupert Murdoch, who is 86 years old.
He turned a single Australian newspaper he inherited from his father at the age of 21 into one of the world’s largest news and film empires.
Murdoch said the transaction makes sense in a media industry undergoing seismic shifts due to online advertising and competitors who are streaming entertainment into homes via the internet.
“With today’s announcement, we launch the next great leg of our journey,” Rupert Murdoch said on Thursday.
“We are paving the way for the new Fox and a transformed Disney to chart a course across a broad frontier of opportunity.”
Disney chief executive Bob Iger said that Disney was “incredibly excited” about the acquisition, and that it was an “opportunity to expand iconic franchises”, including Avatar and Star Wars.
“May the Force be with us all,” Mr Iger said.
