This, the two companies said, will enable the merged company to drive sharper content creation across platforms, strengthen its footprint in the rapidly evolving digital ecosystem, bid for media rights in the fast-growing sports landscape and pursue other growth opportunities. Under the terms of the definitive agreements, SPN will have a cash balance of $1.5 billion (assuming an INR to USD ratio of 75:1) at closing, including through an infusion by the current shareholders of SPN and the promoters of ZEE. Parallelly, the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) is also hearing on the application filed by Invesco. Invesco has challenged the order in front of a division bench and the case is being heard at present.

ZEE board declined the request and got an injunction against the offshore investor from the Bombay high court. Invesco, which owns 17.88% stake in ZEE, had requisitioned the board to conduct an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) of the shareholders to vote on the removal of MD and CEO Punit Goenka from the company’s board. Given that ZEE’s founders have just a 3.99% stake, the success of the deal hinges on shareholder backing as a three-fourths majority will be required to approve the merger. If it goes through, the merger, which was initially announced on September 22 when the two companies signed a non-binding term sheet, will create India’s second-largest entertainment network by revenue and spawn an entity with 75 TV channels, two video streaming services (ZEE5 and Sony LIV), two film studios (Zee Studios and Sony Pictures Films India), a digital content studio (Studio NXT), and programming libraries.

Sony sign in