Comcast, Time Warner Cable burned more than half a billion on failed merger

Shawn Knight

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Comcast’s failed bid to merge with Time Warner Cable was a long shot, one that ultimately costs both companies a considerable amount of money.

In its quarterly earnings report out today, Comcast revealed it burned $99 million during the first quarter in what it called transaction-related costs. As Ars Technica notes, this is in addition to the $99 million it spent in the fourth quarter of last year, $77 million in Q3 2014, $44 million in the second quarter and $17 million in Q1 2014.

That means that Comcast has spent $336 million over the past five quarters trying to get the deal approved.

Comcast VP of Government Communications Sena Fitzmaurice told the publication that the costs are mainly for legal fees and outside consulting firms which includes everything from Human Resources and IT consulting to banks and management consulting services.

Time Warner, meanwhile, has recorded acquisition charges of more than $200 million which includes tens of millions of dollars spent to retain employees.

Comcast CEO Brian Roberts said his company structured the transaction in such a way that it avoided unnecessary risk for shareholders in the event the regulatory outcome didn’t go their way. Roberts is of course referring to AT&T’s hefty breakup fee to T-Mobile when that deal was called off over regulatory concerns.  AT&T had to hand over $3 billion in cash and another $1 billion in spectrum licenses.

Image via Bloomberg News

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Saw the article, said to myself the same thing!
Instead of the board getting rid of the ones responsible for the loss, they'll just earn it back on jacking up the rates to consumers.
 
Comcast and TimeWarner both offer the same thing:
- Dirtbag Pricing
- Dirtbag Fee's
- Dirtbag Support
- Dirtbag Agenda's
- Dirtbag Rates
- Dirtbag Bundles
 
Ok, so even with 50 layers working on this full time at $500/hour would only cost $80m; at $1,000/hour it would cost $160m. I don't think these are legal fees; unless what Comcast is referring to are the fees for bri..I mean lobbying - which doesn't seem to have worked.

And Time Warner?? $200m in trying to retain its employees? hmmm how many employees do they have? lets divide the 200 by that number and see what EVERY SINGLE EMPLOYEE "could have" gotten. Point being, both companies are lying sacks of dung.

I know..I know, I'm actually getting service set up shortly as well.. *sigh* such is life :/
 
Yes, I know the article said only tens of millions for employee retention, but just think of how more useful the 200m could have been ;)
 
And guess who is going to pay for that wasted money - we the customers who have no alternative to Comcast
 
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