The Competition Commission of India (CCI) on Wednesday approved the Rs 70,350 crore ($8.5 billion) merger of Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) and Disney's Indian media assets. The said approval is subject to certain voluntary modifications.
"C-2024/05/1155 Commission approves the proposed combination involving Reliance Industries Ltd, Viacom18 Media Pvt Ltd, Digital18 Media Ltd, Star India Pvt Ltd and Star Television Productions Ltd, subject to the compliance of voluntary modifications," the fair trade regulator stated in a X (formerly Twitter) post.
Under the deal, RIL and its affiliates will hold a 63.16 per cent stake in the combined entity that will house two streaming services and 120 television channels. Walt Disney will hold the remaining 36.84 per cent stake.
Disney+ Hotstar, which is owned by Walt Disney's Star India, is currently one of India's top streaming services with over 500 million downloads on Google Play Store. On the other hand, JioCinema, which is owned by Viacom18 (controlled by RIL), has over 100 million downloads.
Despite the difference, RIL believes that running two separate platforms would be more expensive and less efficient. By merging them, RIL could build a more powerful streaming service that could compete with big players like YouTube, Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video.
Previously, RIL has merger platforms such as Voot into JioCinema. Recently, JioCinema was transferred to Viacom18 after a court-approved deal that also involved a Rs 15,145 crore investment from RIL and Bodhi Tree Systems into Viacom18.
The CCI nod comes just a day before RIL's 47th Annual General Meeting (AGM). The information came during post-market hours today. Earlier in the day, RIL shares settled 0.16 per cent lower at Rs 2,995.75.