Sirius and XM Merger
- Thread starter darrencp22
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It's not one.
Owning all sources of mp3's distribution, terrestrial radio and satellite radio would be a monopoly of personal audio entertainment.
The federal government having absolute power to sell and distribute spectrum however, is a monopoly. They control entirely who, what and for how much. Also remember the moneys raised go exclusively to government employee paychecks and benefits.
Why the government takes years to make this decision but can decide in a few days to invade countries is amazing.
Owning all sources of mp3's distribution, terrestrial radio and satellite radio would be a monopoly of personal audio entertainment.
The federal government having absolute power to sell and distribute spectrum however, is a monopoly. They control entirely who, what and for how much. Also remember the moneys raised go exclusively to government employee paychecks and benefits.
Why the government takes years to make this decision but can decide in a few days to invade countries is amazing.
its a monopoly in the sense that there is no other satellite radio company to compete but overall there is still competition in terrestrial radio
it would make more sense for 1 big company to control the satellite radio than 2 competing companies
If they don't merge 1 or both could be dead within a decade, and it still may happen even if they merge. Not only will terrestrial radio and HD radio hurt them, global wifi will be a thing very soon. In my town there is a town wide free internet all of us can connect to. Speeds are too awfully bad and in time they will have radios that jump from wifi to wifi buffering and playing audio.
They are either going to kill this merger or the 2 will go belly up while still waiting. Hurry up a decide already! Customers and potential customers are in a severe holding pattern waiting to see what happens and then what comes down the pipe.
I am a huge Sirius fan and have a XM touch screen receiver and voice command unit in my truck. XM said they are merging and when it goes thru I will have all the sirius content also. I subscribed for a year and still no sirius. I will not be renewing and prolly wait till they merge before I renew.
My sirius unit was stolen out of the truck... I miss Sirius NFL Moving the Chains
This merger is taking entirely too long to complete. (Over a year). The merging of Sirius and XM is in no way a monopoly. Right now, these companies represent only 4% of the national radio market! Plus, there is entirely way too much competition from all sorts of media, not just terrestrial radio. (Think CD's, MP3's, Podcasts, HDRadio, etc.)
Jim Cramer host of CNBC's Mad Money has gone on record to read names of those congressmen accepting money from lobbyists (National Board of Broadcasters), to influence their vote against the merger. This is turning into quite a politically influenced case.
Examples of other controversial mergers approved by the Department of Justice that were NOT considered monopolistic (Shows how silly this stink over XM/Sirius is).....
-Exxon Mobil merger took 11 months in 1999 and has grown into the largest privately held company in the world. ExxonMobil has the largest sales and profits from any privately- held company ever in 2007.
-Whirlpool's purchase of Maytag took 7 months to approve in 2006. At the time, Whirlpool was the market's largest appliance manufacturer and Maytag was the second. After the acquisition's approval, Whirlpool manufactured over 50% of the dishwashers in the U.S. and 70% of the clothes washers and dryers. Analysts agree that Whirlpool's products' prices have risen since the acquisition.
-AT&T's purchase of Cingular, in 2004, took 7 months to be approved. It created the nation's largest cell phone company.
Again, Sirius and XM are hoping to merge to own 4% of the radio market. It's been over a year to decide if Sirius and XM will be a monopoly? Incidentally, Sirius and XM's merger is valued at $4.5 billion, while ExxonMobil's was $80 billion and AT&T's purchase of Cingular was $41 billion.
Jim Cramer host of CNBC's Mad Money has gone on record to read names of those congressmen accepting money from lobbyists (National Board of Broadcasters), to influence their vote against the merger. This is turning into quite a politically influenced case.
Examples of other controversial mergers approved by the Department of Justice that were NOT considered monopolistic (Shows how silly this stink over XM/Sirius is).....
-Exxon Mobil merger took 11 months in 1999 and has grown into the largest privately held company in the world. ExxonMobil has the largest sales and profits from any privately- held company ever in 2007.
-Whirlpool's purchase of Maytag took 7 months to approve in 2006. At the time, Whirlpool was the market's largest appliance manufacturer and Maytag was the second. After the acquisition's approval, Whirlpool manufactured over 50% of the dishwashers in the U.S. and 70% of the clothes washers and dryers. Analysts agree that Whirlpool's products' prices have risen since the acquisition.
-AT&T's purchase of Cingular, in 2004, took 7 months to be approved. It created the nation's largest cell phone company.
Again, Sirius and XM are hoping to merge to own 4% of the radio market. It's been over a year to decide if Sirius and XM will be a monopoly? Incidentally, Sirius and XM's merger is valued at $4.5 billion, while ExxonMobil's was $80 billion and AT&T's purchase of Cingular was $41 billion.
HD MM said:
And in each of these cases, there was competition within the same market.HD MM said:
ExxonMobil has competitors in the oil market, in all facets of the oil market.
Whirlpool and Maytag have competition, as there are other companies making washers and dryers.
AT&T and Cingular have competition in both long distance and cell phone markets.
But you've managed to leave one off...
Dish Network and DirecTV tried to merge in 2001/2. And although the two only represented about 20 percent of the pay TV market, they represented 100 percent of the DBS market. The Department of Justice didn't even get to stop the deal, as the FCC found it was not in the "public interest" to have one entity hold all DBS licenses in the US. And the FCC has a rule about a single entity owning all DARS licenses.
So even if satellite radio has a 4 percent national radio market share (and I believe it is larger), it may still be a monopoly in the DARS market.
There has been talk that at least some receivers might be able to receive both with a firmware update. For the long term, I don't know that they have announced which satellite system will be kept. A major reason for merging is to cut satellite costs.
The government can approve it, establishing a "single provider."
Or the government can disapprove, and one goes bankrupt (probably XM) and we end up with a "single provider."
Or the government can disapprove, and both go under.
The government can approve it, establishing a "single provider."
Or the government can disapprove, and one goes bankrupt (probably XM) and we end up with a "single provider."
Or the government can disapprove, and both go under.
One won't go bankrupt imho what I see is someone[Bill Gates/Warren Buffet/Steve Jobs]snatching one of em up and making em work in one way,shape or form.
I agree with Alvarez. I think that whether they merge or not, satrad could be in trouble anway- alot sooner than a decade. I have 2 XM and 1 Sirius subs, but recently picked up an HD Radio. Here in the Chicago area there are 55 hd station and 19 hd2 stations(with more coming). AQ is much better than starad Also what is hurting this market is NO INTEOPERABLE RECEIVER.
HD Radio is cool when you can receive it. I live 50 miles north of San Francisco and can receive just one station, a rap station. When I happen to be in SF, it's great, there are a bunch of good stations. Satellite radio is the winner when you are on the road, you get the same programming just about anywhere you are.
IIRC, the initial approvals from the FCC had both of them agree to a combined receiver that would work with both at some nebulous time in the future.
