Martin: Programming Holding Up Liberty-DirecTV Deal

MARTIN: PROGRAMMING HOLDING UP LIBERTY-DIRECTV DEAL
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
Program access issues are holding up the Federal Communications Commission review of the $11 billion deal in which John Malone’s Liberty Media would claim News Corp.’s 38.5% ownership stake in DirecTV, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said Wednesday. EchoStar, small cable operators and consumer groups have raised concerns about the Liberty-News Corp. transaction and about Malone’s return to the pay-TV distribution side of the business. Malone was the controversial head of Tele-Communications Inc., the largest U.S. cable company before it was sold to AT&T in the late 1990s. Chairman Martin, who has been a vocal proponent of the a la carte sale of pay-TV channels, didn't indicate that he wanted to condition the deal on some kind of commitment from Malone that DirecTV will beef up its per-channel offerings.
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