Edited by Deepali Verma
Punit Goenka, Chief Executive Officer of Zee Entertainment Enterprises, reacted to Sony officially calling off the merger of its Bharat’s unit with the Mumbai-based media conglomerate, labelling it a ‘sign from the lord’.
“Upon arrival at Ayodhya early this morning for the auspicious occasion of Pran Pratishtha, I received a message, the contents of which stated that the deal that I have spent 2 years envisioning and working towards had fallen through, irrespective of my best and utmost honest efforts,” wrote Goenka on X.
“I see this as a sign from the Lord. I resolve to proceed forward positively and work towards strengthening Bharat’s pioneering M&E Company, for all its stakeholders,” added the Zee CEO in the social media post.
Japanese entertainment giant Sony officially notified Zee on January 22 of its plans to scrap the merger between its Bharat unit and the media conglomerate. The decision follows a stalemate between the two companies over whether Goenkar would be leading the merged entity amid a probe into its conduct by the Securities Exchange Board of India.
The standoff scuttled the deal, which if it would have fallen into place, had created a $10 billion media giant with the financial muscle to take on global powerhouses such as Netflix Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.
In a statement released by Zee, they talked of initiating an action against Sony for its decision to call off the merger. “Categorically, ZEEL has been in denial of all the assertions raised by Culver Max and BEPL concerning the alleged breaches listed under the terms of the MCA, including their claims for the termination fee,” the Zee statement added.
Zee remarked that Punit Goenka was in favour of “stepping down in the interest of the merger”.Further adding, the statement read,”Discussions regarding the related proposals, such as the appointment of a director to the Board of the merged company along with the provisions for the conduct of ongoing investigations and legal proceedings in the best interest of Zee’s directors and shareholders”.
