Wednesday, March 26, 2008

XM Merger With Sirius Close

The New York Times reports that on Monday the Justice Department gave approval to the merger of two rival satellite radio networks, XM and Sirius. These are currently the only two satellite radio providers with a combined subscription of 17 million.

The proposed merger was announced over a year ago has not been approved by the FCC. There is opposition from consumer groups and broadcasters who say that this will create a monopoly and force a reduction in programming available from the two systems. The Justice Department says that the merger will not cause prices to rise because satellite radio does compete with other program sources, like high-definition radio, iPods, and other MP3 players.

with about 9 million subscribers - currently has programming by Oprah Winfrey, Willie Nelson and Snoop Dogg, and offers play-by-play from Major League Baseball games.

with about 8.3 million subscribers - has programming by Howard Stern, Martha Stewart and National Public Radio, and broadcasts live play-by-play games of the N.F.L. and N.B.A., as well as live Nascar races. Both stations have been operating in the red since they started, they claim that they need the merger to remain a viable programming choice.

Read the entire New York Times article here.


plez sez: i received a Sirius receiver for my car about 4 years ago as a father's day gift... and it remains one of my favorite gifts beside the 80G iPod i received for christmas a few years back! the merger came as good news to me, because i happen to know that neither of these companies are turning a profit and they need to merge to survive.

...and without Sirius, i'll loose my daily fix of - shhhhh, don't tell anyone! - Howard Stern!

with satellite radio, you can choose the type of music you want to listen to - my favorites are old soul, r&b hits, the strobe (disco), classical music, raw dog comedy, and howard stern - with few or no commercial breaks. you can literally set your radio to a station and have hours of uninterrupted programming! satellite radio goes in the "best thing since sliced bread" department along with the Nintendo Wii and Apple iPod!

2 comments:

All-Mi-T [Thought Crime] Rawdawgbuffalo said...

yea, and i own neither in my port folio and would advise u not to either folk

Hathor said...

Can't make a profit? Satellite time too expensive?