Benchmarks: Media and IT

home | about | site use | services | guides | profiles | papers | timeline || Analysphere | Ketupa | Cinetext

media and information technology

This page provides some media and IT industry benchmarks for acquisitions and disposals during the telecommunication booms and busts of the past twenty years.

It covers -

media and entertainment
information and communications technology

There is a broader discussion of the broadcasting, print (and also here), sound recording and film revolutions elsewhere on this site. Telecommunications privatisations and takeovers are also separately highlighted.

media

Media sector landmarks include -

News Corp buys Metromedia for US$1.6bn in 1985
National Amusements buys Viacom for US$3.4bn in 1986
Sony buys CBS Records for US$2bn in 1987
Bond gives Packer $1bn for Nine network in 1987
Time Inc merges with Warner Communications in US$14bn deal in 1989
Sony buys Columbia Pictures and TriStar for US$4.8bn in 1989
Matsushita buys MCA for US$6.6bn in 1990
Dun & Bradstreet pays US$333m for Management Science America in 1990
EMI buys Virgin Music Group for US$960m in 1992
Viacom buys Paramount for US$8.3bn in 1993
Viacom buys Blockbuster for US$4.9bn in 1993
Cox buys Times Mirror Cable for US$2.3bn in 1994
Rogers buys Maclean Hunter for C$3.1bn in 1994
Gannett buys Multimedia for US$2.3bn in 1995
Seagram buys 80% of MCA for US$5.7bn
Westinghouse buys CBS for US$5.4bn in 1995
Disney buys Capital Cities/ABC for US$19bn in 1995
Time Warner buys Turner for US$8.5bn in 1995
Granada buys Forte group for £3.6bn in 1996
CBS buys Infinity for US$4.9bn in 1996
Capstar buys SFX Broadcasting for US$2.1bn in 1997
Belo buys Providence Journal for US$1.5bn in 1997
Reed-Elsevier buys Chilton Business Group from Disney for US$447m in 1997
Mirror Group buys Midland Independent Newspapers for £297m in 1997
Chancellor buys Capstar for US$4.1bn in 1998
Reed-Elsevier buys Matthew Bender & rest of Shepard's for US$1.65bn in 1998
Clear pays US$6.5bn for Jacor in 1998
Bertelsmann buys Random House for US$1.3bn in 1998
AOL buys Netscape for US$4.2bn in 1998
Seagram buys Polygram for US$15bn in 1998
CBS buys King World for US$2.5bn in 1999
Yahoo! buys broadcast.com for US$5.7bn in 1999
VNU buys Nielsen for US$2.7bn in 1999
CBS buys Outdoor Systems for US$6.5bn in 1999
Yahoo buys Geocities for US$5bn in 1999
Viacom buys CBS for US$38bn in 1999
Clear Channel buys AMFM for US$23bn in 1999
AOL and Time Warner merge in US$166bn deal in 2000
Tribune buys Times Mirror for US$6.5bn in 2000
CanWest Global pays C$3.5bn for Hollinger Internationalt's Canadian newspapers in 2000
Telefonica buys Lycos for US$12.5bn in 2000
Granada buys tv interests of United News & Media for £1.75bn in 2000
Vivendi buys Seagram for US$34bn in 2000
Clear buys SFX Entertainment for US$4.4bn in 2000
Thomson buys Harcourt units for US$2.06bn in 2001
Clear buys Ackerley Group radio stations for US$850m in 2001
Forstmann Little buys Citadel for US$2bn in 2001
ntl sells NTL Australia to Macquarie Bank consortium for $850m in 2002
Yahoo buys HotJobs job board for US$436m in 2002
Vivendi sells Groupe Express-Expansion and Groupe l'Etudiant to Hersant's Socpresse for €200m in 2002
ntl sells ntl:broadcast (over 3,000 towers in UK) to Macquarie Communications Infrastructure Group for £1.27bn in 2004
LexisNexis acquires Seisint for US$775m in 2004
Telstra pays $636m for Trading Post classifieds publications in 2004
DirecTV sells 80.5% stake in PanAmSat to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts for US$4.3bn in 2004
New York Times buys About.com for US$410m in 2005
IAC/InterActiveCorp buys Ask Jeeves for US$1.9bn
Lee Enterprises announces plan to acquire Pulitzer newspaper operations for US$1.46bn in 2005
T&F Informa buys IIR for US$1.4bn in 2005
VNU buys IMS Health for US$6.9bn in 2005
Axel Springer announces €2.5bn deal for control of ProSiebenSat in 2005
Macquarie Media Group agrees to buy Taiwan Broadband Communications for $1.19bn in 2005
NTT DoCoMo buys 2.6% stake in Fuji Television for US$176m in 2005
Rank sells Deluxe Film arm to MacAndrews & Forbes for £437m in 2005
Disney buys Pixar for US$7.4bn in 2006

A more comprehensive timeline of media group churn is here.

information and communications technology

IT sector landmarks are -

Honeywell-Bull buys Zenith microcomputer arm for US$635m in 1989
AT&T acquires NCR for US$7.3bn in 1990
Computer Associates buys Pansophic for US$300m in 1991
Adobe buys Aldus for US$525m in 1994
EDS buys AT Kearney for US$600m in 1995
Cisco buys Grand Junction for US$348m in 1995
Cisco buys Stratacom for US$4.8bn in 1996
Novell sells WordPerfect and Quattro Pro to Corel for US$180m in 1996
Apple buys NeXT for US$425m in 1996
Microsoft buys WebTV for US$503m in 1997
Ascend Communications buys Cascade for US$3.7bn in 1997
Microsoft buys Hotmail for US$400m in 1998
BMC buys Boole & Babbage for US$900m in 1998
Nortel buys Bay Networks for US$9.1bn in 1998
Nortel buys Qtera for C$5bn in 1999
BCE spins off most of stake in Nortel for C$73bn in 1999
Cisco buys Pirelli Optical Systems for US$2.1bn in 1999
Nortel buys Alteon WebSystems for C$11.5bn in 2000
Hewlett-Packard merges with Compaq in US$87bn deal in 2001
IBM buys PwC Consulting for US$3.5bn in 2002
IBM buys Rational Software for US$2.1bn in 2002
EMC buys Legato for US$1.3bn in 2003
EMC buys Documentum for US$1.7bn in 2003
Oracle acquires PeopleSoft for US$10.3bn in 2004
Symantec buys Veritas in US$13.5bn deal in 2004
IBM pays US$1.1bn for Ascential in 2005
Oracle buys Siebel for US$5.8bn in 2005
Hitachi pays US$2bn for IBM's hard disk business in 2005
Adobe buys Macromedia for US$3.4bn in 2005
eBay agrees to pay US$2.6bn for Skype in 2005
Cisco agrees to pay US$6.9bn for Scientific-Atlanta in 2005
Texas Instruments sells sensors & controls unit to Bain Capital for US$3bn in 2006

next page (pharmaceuticals and chemicals)