The same old cycle of a mega merger continues. Layoffs are continuing with another round at Global while deals continue to fall through.
when the Rogers Shaw merger was completed last year, we predicted that this will go down like pretty much every other corporate mega merger. There will be lower quality of services, less marketplace choice, and the pink slips start flowing like a river. This despite the usual lies from executives where they say that this will bring better competition, more choice, and lower prices for consumers. That almost never happens with mergers and the Rogers Shaw merger is no exception to that rule.
Shortly after the corporate merger, funding for Shaw related operations were already happening, while the company began hacking and slashing jobs at various radio stations as well. The government, of course, bears some responsibility for this mess given that the Innovation Minister rubber stamped this merger to appease the corporate overlords that run this country. This despite experts pointing out the obvious of what such a merger actually means for consumers. As usual, experts were ignored in all of this.
Like clockwork, the news of these predictable outcomes is continuing to trickle out. According to the Globe and Mail, layoffs have struck Global News:
Corus Entertainment Inc. CJR-B-T is cutting jobs at its Global News division as it seeks efficiencies across the company and battles adverse trends in the media industry.
The cuts came a few days after Corus said it stands to lose programming next year due to an arrangement struck between Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc. RCI-B-T, which will see Rogers pick up rights to content such as HGTV and Food Network.
“As part of our ongoing evaluation of our business and continued enterprise efficiency review across Corus, we have made some changes at Global News today, and as a result, certain roles have been impacted,” Corus spokesperson Anna Arnone said in a statement.
One of those programming changes apparently revolves around the cancellation of Big Brother Canada, a cheap knockoff show of an American program that I personally had zero interest in watching in the first place.
Still, the financial woes of Global is going to continue if the Toronto Star is any indication:
At its height, Global Television was a Canadian powerhouse, watched by more than 17 million people weekly, but today experts say it needs to take drastic action if the show is to go on. After a series of financial blows, high profile layoffs, lost licensing rights and executive departures, analysts interviewed by the Star say the network’s owner will need to dramatically overhaul the company — or be allowed to refinance its debt — to stave off bankruptcy.
Toronto-based Corus Entertainment is Canada’s largest independent media company, owner of Global Television Network, more than 30 local radio stations and the Canadian distributor of channels such as Food Network, Disney Channel and National Geographic. It has amassed a staggering debt of more than $1 billion, with about $300 million due for repayment within three years and no obvious way to raise the money while keeping the company intact.
Obviously, the disaster of the Online News Act didn’t help matters with Meta dropping news links. That likely cut in to revenues at Global News as well. While it’s easy to point the finger at the Online News Act as being partly responsible for the decline of Global News, the details suggest that may have only played a contributing role in all of this. If anything, the major reason for all of this is the disastrous Rogers Shaw merger. After all, Rogers is suddenly getting all of these deals that Corus originally had? That’s… kind of an indication of where the main source of the blame lies there.
At any rate, anything Shaw related is continuing to get hollowed out thanks to this merger. While the handful of supporters of this merger have insisted that this will lead to more choice for consumers, all indications point to the fact that it’s on the way to leaving Canadian consumers with less.
The cuts at Corus had nothing to do with the merger. Global has been bleeding red ink for years. Corus’s radio stations have been losing listeners to streamers and podcasts. The cable channels have been keeping Corus afloat, but they have been losing viewers because of cordcutting. Rogers outbidding Corus for the rights to Discovery content is likely the final blow for Corus. Corus will likely go into bankruptcy and its debt will be restructured or its pieces will be sold off.
Streaming has disrupted the market and made a loser out of Corus. The question going forward is can Canada still support four broadcast networks (CTV, CBC, City and Global) or should one of them shut down or be merged with another network, say City and Global.