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AT&T is seeking to take Time Warner — the second-greatest content library next to Disney — out of play, which therefore puts all other content makers in play, accordingly raising their value, and, at least in the short term, making AT&T look smart.
Wait. AT&T? AT&T?
The 30-year fallacy of media consolidation has been that anybody can own a media company. That it’s about management and not temperament. Sony, a Japanese consumer electronics company, bought CBS Records in 1988 and Columbia Pictures in 1989. This was after Coca-Cola bought Columbia in 1982. General Electric bought NBC in 1986. Westinghouse, a manufacturing company, bought CBS in 1995. Universal was first bought by Matsushita, another Japanese consumer electronics company, in 1990, then Seagram’s, the spirits company, in 1995, then Vivendi, a French water company, in 2000. That same year, AOL, an online service and dial-up ISP, bought Time Warner. All of these deals — all of them, save for Sony’s studio venture — were ultimately undone and provided cautionary lessons, foremost among them that creative enterprises tend to form a closed culture that eschews, frustrates and often fleeces outsiders.
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List of assets owned by AT&T
1 Home Box Office, Inc.
2 Turner Broadcasting System
3 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
3.1 Warner Bros. Pictures Group
3.2 Warner Bros. Television Group
3.3 Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group
4 Content libraries
5 Investments
6 Other units
7 Former assets
7.1 Sold or spun off
7.2 Dormant or shuttered
Home Box Office, Inc.
HBO
HBO2
HBO Comedy
HBO Family
HBO Latino
HBO Signature
HBO Zone
Cinemax
MoreMax
5StarMax
ActionMax
Cinemáx
MovieMax
OuterMax
ThrillerMax
HBO Go
HBO Now
HBO on Demand
Cinemax on Demand
HBO Home Entertainment
RED by HBO
Warner Channel
HBO Films
HBO Miniseries
HBO Sports
HBO Entertainment
HBO Kids
HBO Original Productions
HBO Documentary Films
HBO International
HBO Asia
HBO Europe
HBO Hungary
HBO India
HBO Poland
HBO Romania
HBO Latin America Group
HBO Latin America
HBO Brazil
Warner Channel
E! Latin America
Cinemax Latin America
Turner Broadcasting System
Turner Broadcasting International
Millennium Media Group
Turner Broadcasting System Latin America
Chilevisión
Turner Entertainment Networks
truTV
TBS
TNT
Studio T
Turner Studios
TCM
TCM Productions
FilmStruck
Turner Sports
Turner Sports & Entertainment Digital Network
Bleacher Report
Universal Wrestling Corporation (UWC)
TBS, Inc. Animation, Young Adults & Kids Media (AYAKM) division
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network Productions
Cartoon Network Studios
Cartoon Network Development Studio Europe
Adult Swim
Boomerang
Williams Street
Williams Street West
Williams Street Records
Hulu (10%) (in partnership with Comcast and The Walt Disney Company)
NonStop Television
Mezzo
Cartoon Network Nordic
TNT7
CNN News Group
CNN
HLN
Great Big Story[3]
International
TCM & Cartoon Network / Asia Pacific
Cartoonito
TNT Latin America
Pogo
I.Sat
HTV
Tooncast
Turner Japan K.K. (formerly Japan Entertainment Network K.K. and Japan Image Communications Co.,Ltd.)
Cartoon Network
Boomerang
TABI Channel
Tabitele
MONDO TV
Mondo Mahjong TV
Joint Ventures
Turner Entertainment Media Networks Limited
CNN Chile
CETV
CNN-IBN
CNNj
CNN TÜRK
CNN.co.jp (Japanese)
Zee Turner Ltd (India)
Boing
Turner International India Private Limited
WB Channel
Cartoon Network (India)
Websites/Broadband Services
CallToons
Super Deluxe
Beme Inc.
Technology
iStreamPlanet
LTS Garðbær Studios
Wit Puppets
Le Gué Enterprises BV
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
DC Entertainment
Warner Bros. Consumer Products
Warner Bros. Digital Networks
Warner Bros. Theatre Ventures
Warner Bros. Pictures International
Warner Bros. Museum
Warner Bros. Pictures Group
Warner Bros. Pictures
Music
Domestic Distribution
Warner Animation Group
Warner Bros. Family Entertainment
DC Films
New Line Cinema
Turner Entertainment Co.
WaterTower Music
Warner Bros. Domestic Distribution
Castle Rock Entertainment
The Wolper Organization
Flagship Entertainment (China) (49%) (joint venture with China Media Capital (41%) and TVB (10%))
Warner Bros. Television Group
Blue Ribbon Content
Warner Bros. Television
Warner Horizon Television
Warner Bros. Television Distribution
Warner Bros. International Television Production
Warner Bros. Television Productions UK
Ricochet
Twenty Twenty
Wall to Wall
Renegade Pictures
Yalli Productions
Eyeworks
Telepictures
Momlogic
Alloy Entertainment
eleveneleven
The CW (50% with CBS Corporation)
Warner Bros. Animation
Hanna-Barbera Cartoons
Fandango Media (30% with NBCUniversal)
Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group
Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
WB Games
Avalanche Software
Monolith Productions
NetherRealm Studios
Portkey Games
Rocksteady Studios
TT Games
TT Games Publishing
TT Fusion
Traveller’s Tales
TT Animation
Playdemic
Turbine
WB Games Montréal
WB Games San Francisco
WB Games New York
Content libraries
List of libraries owned by Warner Bros.
Investments
Adify (Acquired by Cox)
Admeld (Acquired by Google)
Arroyo (Acquired by Cisco)
BigBand Networks (Acquired by ARRIS)
BroadLogic (Acquired by Broadcom)
Entropic Communications (IPO in December 2007)
GoldPocket (Acquired by Tandberg TV)
Glu Mobile (IPO in March 2007)
Kosmix (Acquired by Walmart)
Maker Studios (Acquired by The Walt Disney Company)
MediaVast (Acquired by Getty Images)
Meebo (Acquired by Google)
N2 Broadband (Acquired by Tandberg TV)
NuvoTV (Acquired by Fuse Networks, LLC)
PlanetOut (IPO in October 2004)
PlaySpan (Acquired by Visa)
ScanScout (Acquired by Tremor Media)
SkyStream Networks (Acquired by Tandberg TV)
Tumri (Acquired by Collective)
Vindigo (Acquired by For-Side)
Other units
Global Media Group
Time Warner Medialab
Time Warner Investments – venture capital unit
Adaptly
Bluefin Labs
Conviva
CrowdStar
Dynamic Signal
Double Fusion
Everyday Health
Exent
Gaia Online
tvtag previously as GetGlue
Simulmedia
Tremor Video
Trion Worlds
VisibleWorld
Former assets
Family Life, was sold to Time Warner in 1999
Sold or spun off
ACC Select
Atlanta Hawks
Atlanta Thrashers
Comedy Central (50% with Viacom)
Time Inc.
IPC Media
AOL
New York Cosmos
Panavision
Pittsburgh Pirates (48% with John W. Galbreath)
Six Flags – acquired by Premier Parks in 1998
Time Warner Cable
E!
Atari, Inc. – sold to Jack Tramiel on July 1, 1984 for 50 dollars cash and 240 million in stock and notes.
College Television Network – private network programming sold to MTV in 2002.
Time4 Media – formerly Times Mirror magazines group purchased from Tribune Company, sold to Bonnier Group & World Publications[7]
TransWorld Media division
TransWorld SKATEboarding
TransWorld SURF
TransWorld SNOWboarding
Ride BMX
TransWorld Motocross
QUAD Off-Road Magazine
Popular Science
Marine Group
Time4Outdoors
Mountain Sports Media
Parenting Group – Time, Inc. magazine group, sold to Bonnier and World Publications
PlayON! Sports Network
The Smoking Gun
Time Warner Book Group
Time Life
Time–Life Records
Warner Music Group
Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment (Joint venture with American Express, now Viacom Media Networks)
WPCH
WRWB-TV
Dormant or shuttered
These are Time Warner divisions which have been closed or folded into another part of the company.
Associated Artists Productions – bought Popeye cartoons and pre-1950 WB library in 1956; the latter library would find its way back to Warner ownership in 1996 as part of the Turner merger (which also incorporated the Popeye cartoons)
Bamzu.com
World Championship Wrestling (WCW) – video library, selected wrestler contracts and other intellectual property sold to World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc., now known as WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment), through its subsidiary W. Acquisition Company (which was subsequently renamed WCW Inc. following the sale) in 2001.[10] The promotion itself, which is still owned by Time Warner, reverted to its previous name, Universal Wrestling Corporation,[11] and now functions solely to deal with old contracts and lawsuits.[12]
Monogram Pictures/Allied Artists Pictures Corporation – sold to Lorimar in 1979
Interstate Television – founded in early 1950s as the TV arm of Allied Artists, became Allied Artists Television in 1960s and was folded into Lorimar with the rest of AAPC in 1979
Picturehouse – renamed from Fine Line Features in 2005, closed in 2008; reopened in 2013 as an independent studio
National General Pictures – sold to Warner Bros. in 1973
The WB – 64% joint venture with Tribune Broadcasting, closed in 2006
Warner Independent Pictures – closed in 2008
Warner Premiere – closed in 2012
Midway Games – shut down under bankruptcy in 2009
Atari Games
WildStorm Productions – dissolved into DC Comics in 2011
American Companies You Didn’t Know Were Owned By Chinese Investors
While you may think the classic American brands you see every day are entirely domestic, many are actually owned by Chinese investors.
The United States is home to many iconic American brands that dominate the global market; However, while these brands may seem All-American, even they have important stakeholders all over the globe. Keep reading to see which U.S. giants are backed by foreign conglomerates.
1. AMC
Popular cinema company AMC, short for American Multi-Cinema, has been around for over a century and is headquartered in Leawood, KS. In 2012, Beijing-based Dalian Wanda Group became the majority stakeholder, giving them the power to make decisions at the executive level. Wanda invested $2.8 billion in the historic deal.
AMC owned by Chinese investorsAs the largest cinema company in the world, AMC is owned by several investors. In 2018, Silver Lake Partners of Menlo Park, CA made an investment of $600 million, giving the company some executive power, but still much less than Wanda.
When asked if they would help AMC while it struggles through the Covid economic crisis, Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said:
“They ‘could,’ but it would require cash outflow from China to a foreign business, and Wanda was limited in its ability to further invest by the Chinese government a couple of years ago.”
Thus, AMC will struggle to stay afloat for the indefinite future without help from its Chinese investors.
2. General Motors
SAIC GM owned by Chinese investorsBased in Detroit, Michigan, General Motors is known as America’s largest automobile manufacturer. While the company isn’t owned by a Chinese company, it relies on its partnership with Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp (SAIC) to stay profitable. In 1998, the two auto giants teamed up to form SAIC-GM, a Chinese brand with a 6 million square-foot facility in Shanghai.
While GM is still extremely popular in the U.S., its extra sales in China through SAIC help to bring in revenue regularly.
3. Spotify
Spotify owned by Chinese investors partially
Originally a Swedish company, Spotify now has headquarters in multiple areas across the globe including New York City. While its CEO and founder holds a large percentage of the company, Chinese investor Tencent Holdings Limited LLC bought 10% of the company back in 2017 while Spotify bought 10% of Tencent’s holdings.
At the time, Spotify wasn’t strong enough to make it in the Chinese market and needed some help to break in. This isn’t the only time that Tencent will be featured on this list–they can spot a successful venture from miles away.
4. Snapchat
Snapchat’s founders never could’ve estimated the level of long-term success that the app would achieve. Just last year, the app counted a total of 187 million active users. Although it was created in 2011, it didn’t go public on the New York Stock Exchange until 2017. Snapchat
Unsurprisingly, its shares were incredibly popular–the company sold over 200 million shares at $17 and sold the rest to investors.
Although rival company Facebook offered to buy Snapchat for $4 billion, they opted out. Instead, Tencent Holdings bought a large share of yet another tech giant. The Chinese Investor owns about 14% of Snapchat’s shares.
5. Hilton Hotels
Hilton owned by chinese investorsSince 1919, Hilton has become a household name throughout the U.S. and other countries. In 2016, HNA Group, Chinese aviation and shipping giant, bought a 25% stake for $6.5 billion. This acquisition put two Chinese directors on Hilton’s Board of 10.
HNA has been trying to sell its share for the past two years with no success.
6. General Electric Appliance Division
General electricGeneral Electric covers a wide range of industries and their appliance division is manufactured in the USA with global parts (and with domestic parts whenever possible). However, in 2016, Chinese investor Haier bought the company’s appliance division for $5.4 billion.
While all products are still made in America, the ideas are generated in China. It’s quite different from other American brands because GE has been around since 1892.
While investors don’t necessarily affect where a product is made, in many cases, they have a large influence in how a business is run and marketed. It’s dangerous when any large American brand is partially owned by Chinese or other foreign investors because they have greater responsibilities in their homeland. In the case of AMC, the Chinese investors are unlikely to help out during Covid due to domestic obligations.
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Chinese Investment in the United States Database
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