The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) today, 10 August, approved the merger of an Indian unit of Japan’s Sony and India’s Zee Entertainment Enterprises.
With this, the government body NCLT granted a key regulatory approval in the merger, a deal that was announced in 2021 but was delayed due to multiple reasons. NCLT’s division bench had reserved its order for the merger on 10 July after hearing objections from several creditors.
In late 2021, Sony (now known as Culver Max Entertainment) and Zee had decided to merge their TV channels, digital assets like streaming platforms, production operations and film assets. The media giants then approached NCLT for sanctioning the merger after receiving necessary approvals from other government bodies like National Stock Exchange (NSE), the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), Competition Commission of India (CCI) and the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
As per the arrangement of this deal, Sony Group will indirectly hold 50.86 per cent of the combined company, while Zee’s founder will own around 4 per cent. The rest of the shares will be distributed amongst the shareholders of Zee.
The Sony-Zee merger verdict was pronounced by NCLT’s Mumbai bench comprising HV Subba Rao and technical member Madhu Sinha. As per reports, Zee was represented by senior advocate Janak Dwarkadas briefed by a team led by advocate Nitesh Jain from Trilegal.
