If Rupert Murdoch or any company were to purchase Time Warner, Atlanta-based Turner Broadcasting would be considered a crucial cog in the package.
Turner Broadcasting, which is headquartered in Atlanta and employs about half of its 13,000 worldwide employee base here, has been a major revenue and profit hub for New York-based Time Warner.
The unit generated $2.59 billion in revenue for Time Warner during the first quarter of 2014, up from $2.47 billion for the same quarter in 2014. That’s 38 percent of Time Warner’s total revenue. Better yet, it produced $900 million in profits, or 44 percent of total Time Warner profits.
“Turner is essential to the existence of Time Warner through its sports rights,” said Rich Hanley, associate professor of journalism at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut, and close watcher of the TV business. Turner has lucrative deals with the NCAA, the NBA and Major League Baseball.
If Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox were to pick up Time Warner, Hanley said, “it could deepen the viability of Murdoch’s fledgling sports network Fox Sports 1 against NBC and ESPN.”
In addition, Turner’s TNT and TBS have been among the top five most popular basic cable networks for much of the past decade. Adult Swim content on the Cartoon Network brings in hard-to-reach younger male viewers, which are key for ad revenue.
Still, Murdoch would likely have to shed Turner’s CNN operations because his company already owns Fox News and could face anti-trust scrutiny. Both CBS and the Walt Disney Co., which owns ABC, have shown past interest in acquiring CNN, noted Frank Sesno, director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University and a former CNN correspondent.
CNN — which remains a formidable brand despite domestic network ratings woes — has cooperated with CBS before, allowing evening host Anderson Cooper, for instance, to do stories for “60 Minutes.”
Time Warner purchased Turner from founder Ted Turner 18 years ago for what was valued at the time at $7.5 billion. Murdoch’s recent $80 billion bid was rejected by Time Warner.
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