Corporate Grapevine

Published: Dec 29, 2021
Updated: Dec 29, 2021

Zee continues to thwart Reliance takeover bid

The Zee promoters, the Subhash Chandra family, are trying to use all the tricks in the bag to stop Reliance Industries from acquiring their company.

In February, RIL proposed to merge one of the divisions under its subsidiary Jio platform, Jio Cinemas, and Viacom18, a subsidiary of TV18, with Zee. The problem, as per the Zee camp, is that RIL inflated the valuation of both Jio Cinemas and Viacom18 by Rs 10,000 crore. Zee insiders say that Jio Cinemas, a video-on-demand service, was over-valued despite having no track record of profits.

Interestingly, all the parties to the dispute — RIL, Zee and Invesco — preferred to keep mum on the issue till Invesco decided to unsettle the Subhash Chandra family by trying to oust Punit Goenka, current MD and CEO, from the firm in early September.

Even during the legal battle, Invesco and Zee did not mention the RIL merger proposal.

Subhash Chandra has already warned Oppenheimer-backed Invesco not to act like an owner and try to take a decision on behalf of the company. Invesco owns an 18 per cent stake in the company and wants to exit by selling its shares to the highest bidder.