Disney to Buy Comcast’s Remaining Stakes in Hulu by December 2023

Summary

Hulu is going to be fully under Disney this December, following the complete acquisition of the remaining 33% of Comcast’s stakes.

Hulu’s acquisition by Disney has been going on this year, with Disney sharing its plans to combine the two streaming services in one app, but then the deal was shifted to buy out the Comcast stakes by the end of September. Now, Hulu is only left with 33% stakes in Comcast, which has been planned to be taken over finally on 1st December.

The stakes of Comcast in Hulu are worth at least $27.5 billion, according to the 2019 deal, when it all panned out. Comcast’s NBCUniversal is ready to walk away with such a cost (if not more), to revitalize its solely standing streaming service, Peacock.

Although Disney could take out more to pay according to the equity value of Hulu as of September 30th, the prize for Hulu has definitely gone up. As the CEO of Comcast, Brian L. Roberts had hypothetically indicated the worth of Hulu 5 years ago, it is obviously not the same, with Hulu having 48.3 million subscribers at the end of Disney’s third quarter.

At the Goldman Sachs’ Communacopia and Technology conference, Roberts confirmed to the press:

“…the minimum $27.5 billion that people have bandied about, that was a hypothetical that we picked five years ago because Disney has control of the company. The company is way more valuable today than it was then.”

Disney has disclosed the plans to hire official bankers for both parties to come up with a firm sale price. If the final price is higher than the estimated $27.5 billion, Disney is ready to disburse NBC Universal its percentage of the difference. This appraisal is expected to be done and dusted by 2024.

With Disney Bundles available for the viewers, they are ready to merge the apps by pushing forward the “single app experience.” This catapults the audience into a frenzy since Disney Plus’ content is kid-friendly and Hulu is based on adult content, like Only Murders in the Building.

While it is happening before our eyes, we are eager to know about your thoughts.

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