LAWFUEL – The Legal Newswire – NBC Universal said on Tuesday it would buy Oxygen Media, the cable channel that caters to women and was co-founded by Oprah Winfrey, for $925 million in a bid to win a larger female audience and more closely link its TV and Internet businesses, FOX reports.
NBC Universal will add Oxygen, a network available in more than 74 million homes, to a cable TV business that already includes Bravo, USA, Sci-Fi, CNBC and MSNBC. The deal is expected to close in November.
NBC Universal, which is majority-owned by General Electric Co (GE), also said Oxygen complemented the iVillage.com Internet community site for women that it bought for $600 million in 2006.
NBC envisions Oxygen, along with the Bravo and iVillage properties, delivering a range of options to advertisers to reach the demographic of young women and affluent women, NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker said on a conference call.
Zucker also said the media company would consider taking a look at further acquisitions of cable networks, which now account for about 50 percent of the NBC Universal’s profits.
“As we’ve said all along, cable is the real driver of this company,” he said. “It’s something we will always take a look at and always be interested in. There is nothing specific at this point, but we’re always be opportunistic about other cable networks.”
