MUMBAI: Pan-Asian sports broadcaster ESPN Star Sports (ESS) is busy beefing up its content line-up by acquiring new properties. It has snapped up exclusive broadcast rights for all Football Association (FA) Cup matches, The FA Community Shield and all Senior and Under-21 England Team home matches for the next six years until 2018 for the South Asia Region including India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Maldives, Bhutan and Nepal.

The rights were earlier held by Sony Pix, the English movie channel from Multi Screen Media stable.

The multimedia platform deal, which allows the content to be made available across television, internet and mobile, was made with international media rights company MP & Silva. The FA Cup is recognised as the oldest and most famous domestic knockout competition, which traditionally begins in November and culminates with the Final in May.

Starting from 3 November, ESS will begin broadcast of the first round of matches all the way up to the Final in May next year. Chelsea are currently the holders of the FA Cup but are likely to be challenged for the prestigious title by the other Premier League teams including Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United and Manchester City, among others.

With this acquisition, ESS?s football line-up will include the Barclays Premier League, the Spanish Liga BBVA as well as the Italian Serie A, whose exclusive broadcast rights were recently secured from MP & Silva.

ESS MD Peter Hutton said, "Having a season round offering of football is at the heart of our dominance of the Indian sports market, and the unique stories that the FA Cup creates every year is a very welcome part of our line-up. The FA Cup was seen in India long before the Premier League and the other European leagues, and we?re very proud to be able to continue the tradition."

"We are excited to work with ESPN STAR Sports who will continue to provide excellent exposure for the England Team and The FA Cup on a multi-platform basis in key Asian markets. These markets are important to us and we?re going to be putting together some exciting initiatives in India in particular, including bringing The FA Cup out to the sub-continent," The FA Group Commercial Director Stuart Turner.

Every year, ESS broadcasts up to 2,500 hours of live football content for the South Asian region from the world?s biggest leagues, and is supported by ESS-produced football programmes such as The Verdict, Scorecast, BPL Express, Goals, Full Time Action and Football Extra, Primetime Premier League, Super Sunday, catering to the demands of a varied football audience.

NEW DELHI: Sony Pictures has been permitted by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to buy out the Indian promoters in Multi Screen Media as it feels that the "proposed combination is not likely to have an appreciable adverse effect on competition in India".

The Commission gave its approval under Section 31 (1) of the Competition Act, noting that the approval is without prejudice to any other legal/statutory obligations and will stand revoked if the information provided by the parties is found to be incorrect.

The Commission said: "Upon consummation of the proposed combination, the shareholding of Sony In MSM will increase from 62 to 94.39 per cent and thereafter, the acquirers will make MSM India undertaken any action including those mentioned in the Shareholders Agreement for which currently the consent/approval of the sellers - Atlas Equifin and Grandway Global Holdings would be required."

Thus, the combination will result in transfer from joint to sole control for the purposes of the Combination Regulations.

Sony Pictures Television (SPT), a wholly owned subsidiary of the US-based Sony Pictures Entertainment, had in June inked a deal with these shareholders to acquire 32 per cent stake for $271 million.

The seven Indian promoters, including Singapore-based investment banker Rakesh Agarwal, Shemaroo Films managing director Raman Maroo, World Media Group‘s Sudesh Iyer, actor Jackie Shroff and businessman Sadanand Sule, together own 32 per cent in the broadcaster via their consortium company Atlas Equifin and Grandway Global Holdings.

After the acquisition, the remaining six per cent will be held by international fund Capital International Group.

The deal is subject to government approval and the transaction will be completed by the end of December.

According to MSM CEO Manjit Singh, acquisition of the shares will be made in stages, with $145 million (about Rs 8.09 billion) expected to be paid by SPT by the end of December. The remaining $126 million will be paid in three equal annual installments starting from the fiscal year ending March 2014.

MSM runs eight channels: Sony TV, Max, Sab, Sony Pix, AXN, Animax and the recently launched music channel Mix and sports channel Six.