Liberty Media
The
Liberty Media Corporation is an American
media conglomerate. Control is exercised by engineer Dr.
John Malone, with a majority of the voting shares.
In May 2006, Liberty shareholders approved the creation of two new tracking stocks:[
1]
* Liberty Interactive Group (,)
* Liberty Capital (, )
Liberty Interactive Group's subsidiaries include:
*
QVC, Inc.
* Provide Commerce
Liberty Interactive Group's interests include:
*
Expedia, Inc.
*
IAC/InterActiveCorp*
OpenTVLiberty Capital includes:
* 20% interest in
News Corporation[
2]
* 4.1 percent of
Time Warner[
3]
Liberty's other private and public assets include
*
Starz!*
Encore*
GSN (50% stake with
Sony Pictures). On May 2006, Liberty Media bought
IDT Entertainment from
IDT Corporation.
It originated as part of
TCI, a
United States cable television group, and acquired by
AT&T ('Ma Bell') in
1999 for $54 billion.
It was spun-off from AT&T in the second half of
2001, subsequently spending $5 billion on nine
German regional cable networks. Apart from television distribution it holds major interests in other groups. For example it is the largest shareholder in
News Corporation (though the founding
Murdoch family owns more
voting shares), and has a 4 % stake in
Time Warner. As of December 2003 it has never paid a dividend.
In May 2006, Time Warner acquired Liberty Media's 50% stake in
Court TV for $735 million.[
4]
On May 16, 2006, IDT sold its IDT Entertainment division to
Liberty Media for "for all of Liberty Media's interests in IDT, $186 million in cash and the assumption of existing indebtedness." IDT Entertainment's assets and
Starz Entertainment Group's popular line of premium TV channels will combine to produce content for all distribution platforms. [
5]
Members of the board of Liberty Media are:
Robert Bennett,
Donne Fisher,
Paul Gould,
Gregory Maffei,
John Malone,
David Rapley,
LaVoy Robison, and
Larry Romrell.
*
Official web site*
Ketupa - Liberty Media Corporation in-depth profile
*
Yahoo! - Liberty Media Corporation Company Profile
