English Entertainment
Sillerman’s CKX acquires ‘American Idol’ owner for $ 161 million
MUMBAI: Sports Entertainment Enterprises, Inc’s CKX Inc., the control of which was recently acquired by Robert F X Sillerman, announced that it had acquired UK based 19 Entertainment Limited.
Founded by Simon Fuller, 19 Entertainment, is the creator of Pop Idol, the format of which is now rolling out worldwide in conjunction with Fremantle Media. In addition, CKX has also entered into a long-term agreement with Fuller.
This transaction follows CKX’s recent acquisition of a controlling interest in Elvis Presley Enterprises, which owns and controls the commercial utilisation of the name, image and likeness of Presley, the operation of the Graceland museum and related attractions, as well as revenue derived from Presley’s, television specials, films and certain of his music.
CKX acquired 19 Entertainment from its shareholders, including Fuller, for total consideration consisting of $124.4 million in cash and 1,870,558 shares of CKX common stock, each paid at closing, and an additional $36.9 million in either cash or stock to be paid following delivery of audited results for the fiscal year ended 30 June, 2005.
The Company financed the cash consideration with borrowings and through the exercise of $25 million of outstanding common stock purchase warrants held by Sillerman and other members of management of CKX, the Huff Alternative Fund, the Company’s largest institutional equity investor, and an affiliate of Huff. The warrants were obtained by Sillerman, Huff and the other holders in connection with their initial investments in the Company in February 2005.
19 Entertainment is a leading creator and producer of entertainment properties, including American Idol in the US, Pop Idol in the UK, as well as versions of the Pop Idol format in more than 30 countries around the world.
In addition to creating and producing entertainment programming, the Company has recording contracts with and manages or has managed some of the world’s best known musicians and other artists, including the Spice Girls, Annie Lennox, S Club 7 and former American Idol and Pop Idol participants, such as Kelly Clarkson, Clay Aiken, Ruben Studdard and Fantasia.
The Company has also entered into an exclusive global joint venture with David and Victoria Beckham.
Commenting on the 19 acquisition, Sillerman said, “Simon Fuller and his associates at 19 Entertainment have a long history of developing and building some of the most impactful branded entertainment properties in the world. We are thrilled to have them as partners of CKX. As we grow our business, the content that 19 owns, controls, is developing, or develops in the future will become important elements in our effort to refocus the relationship between the creators of content and the distributors of that content.”
Fuller added, “This is a hugely exciting new partnership for myself and 19 Entertainment. CKX will provide 19 with a powerful platform for global growth and allow us to fully take advantage of all the amazing opportunities that lie ahead. Bob Sillerman is a true visionary. From the very first day we met it was clear that we shared the same dynamic vision for the direction of the entertainment industry in the 21st century and the ever increasing importance of content and creativity. I cannot wait to get started.”
In addition to controlling the operations of 19 Entertainment and its subsidiaries, Fuller will be appointed a director of CKX and will play a key role in planning and implementing the Company’s overall creative direction. Fuller, who founded 19 Entertainment in 1985, has spent his entire career in the entertainment industry and has been publicly recognised as among the most successful British music managers of all time.
CKX is engaged in the ownership, development and commercial utilisation of entertainment content.
UK: The aerial is losing its grip. As broadband becomes the default way Britons watch television, the UK is edging towards a decisive, and divisive, question: should Freeview be switched off by 2034? The issue, highlighted in reporting by The Guardian, has exposed deep fault lines over access, affordability and the future of public service broadcasting.
For nearly 25 years, Freeview has delivered free-to-air television from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 to almost every corner of the country. Even now, it remains the UK’s largest TV platform, used in more than 16m homes and on around 10m main household sets. Yet the same broadcasters that built it are now pressing for its closure within eight years.
Their case rests on a structural shift in viewing. Smart TVs, superfast broadband and the Netflix-led streaming boom have pulled audiences online. Advertising economics have followed. By 2034, the number of homes using Freeview as their main TV set is forecast to fall from a peak of almost 12m in 2012 to fewer than 2m, making digital terrestrial television, or DTT, increasingly costly to sustain.
But critics say the rush to switch off risks abandoning those least able, or least willing, to move online.
“I don’t want to be choosing apps and making new accounts,” says Lynette, 80, from Kent. “It is time-consuming and irritating trying to work out where I want to be, to remember the sequence of clicks, with hieroglyphics instead of words. If I make a mistake I have to start again.”
Lynette is among nearly 100,000 people who have signed a “save Freeview” petition launched by campaign group Silver Voices. She fears the government is about to “take [Freeview] away from me and others who either don’t like, can’t afford, or can’t use online versions”.
Official figures underline the fault lines. A report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport estimates that by 2035, 1.8m homes will still depend on Freeview. Ofcom’s analysis shows those households are more likely to be disabled, older, living alone, female, and based in the north of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Freeview is owned by the public service broadcasters through Everyone TV, which also operates Freesat and the newer streaming platform Freely. After two years of review, DCMS is expected to set out its position soon, drawing on three options proposed by Ofcom: a costly upgrade of Freeview’s ageing technology; maintaining a bare-bones service with only core PSB channels; or a full switch-off during the 2030s.
The broadcasters have rallied behind the third option. They argue that 2034 is the logical cut-off, when transmission contracts with network operator Arqiva expire. By then, they say, the cost of broadcasting to a dwindling audience will far outweigh the returns from TV advertising.
Ofcom agrees a crunch point is approaching. In July, the regulator warned of a “tipping point” within the next few years, after which it will no longer be commercially viable for broadcasters to carry the costs of DTT.
Others see risks beyond economics. Questions remain over whether internet TV can reliably deliver emergency broadcasts, such as the daily Covid updates, in the way that universally available DTT can. The UK radio industry has also warned that an internet-only future for TV could push up distribution costs and force some radio stations off air if PSBs no longer share Arqiva’s mast network.
“It is a political hot potato,” says Dennis Reed, founder of Silver Voices, who says he has “dissociated” his organisation from the government’s stakeholder forum, which he believes is “heavily biased” towards streaming.
The Future TV Taskforce, representing the PSBs, counters that moving online could “close the digital divide once and for all”. “We want to be able to plan to ensure that no one is left behind,” a spokesperson says, adding that rising DTT costs could otherwise mean cuts to programme budgets.
The numbers show the scale of the challenge. Of the 1.8m Freeview-dependent homes projected for 2035, around 1.1m are expected to have broadband but not use it for TV. The remaining 700,000 are forecast to lack a broadband connection altogether.
Veterans of the analogue switch-off, completed in 2012 after 76 years, recall similar fears of “TV blackout chaos”. Around 6 per cent of households were labelled “digital refuseniks”, yet a targeted help scheme and a national campaign, fronted by a robot called Digit Al voiced by Matt Lucas, delivered a largely smooth transition.
This time, the BBC is less keen to foot the bill. Tim Davie, the outgoing director general, has said the corporation should not fund a comparable support programme for a Freeview switch-off.
Research for Sky by Oliver & Ohlbaum suggests that with early awareness campaigns and digital inclusion measures, only about 330,000 households would ultimately need hands-on help ahead of a 2034 shutdown.
Meanwhile, viewing habits continue to fragment. Audience body Barb says 7 per cent of UK households no longer own a TV set, choosing to watch on other devices. In December, YouTube overtook the BBC’s combined channels in total UK viewing across TVs, smartphones and tablets, albeit measured at a minimum of three minutes.
That shift may accelerate. YouTube has recently blocked Barb and its partner Kantar from accessing viewing session data, limiting transparency just as online platforms consolidate power.
“When the government chose British Satellite Broadcasting as the ‘winner’ in satellite TV it was Rupert Murdoch’s Sky instead that came out on top,” says a senior TV executive quoted by The Guardian. “There already is such an outsider ready to be the winner in the transition to internet TV; it is YouTube.”
Freeview’s future now hangs on a familiar British dilemma: modernise fast and risk exclusion, or protect universality and pay the price. Either way, the aerial’s days as king of the living room look numbered.
