U.K. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has officially issued a public interest intervention notice regarding Sky’s proposed acquisition of public service broadcaster ITV. This move triggers investigations by both the media regulatory body Ofcom and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).
The CMA is tasked with scrutinizing the deal from a jurisdictional and competition perspective, while Ofcom will investigate in terms of public interest. Both bodies have a deadline of Jan. 27 to report back, at which point Nandy will decide whether to instruct the CMA to carry out a more detailed investigation.
Comcast-owned Sky announced earlier this year plans to acquire ITV for $2.1 billion. The deal is specifically for the network and its proprietary streaming platform, ITVX, which would result in the spinning off of ITV Studios.
Nandy stated she did not see a need to issue a foreign state intervention notice. Regarding the current notice, Nandy said, “On 15 October 2026 my Department wrote to Sky UK Limited and ITV plc to inform them I was minded to intervene in the anticipated merger between Sky UK Ltd and ITV Media & Entertainment Holdings Ltd under the Enterprise Act 2002 (“the Act”) and inviting them to submit representations. Having fully considered their representations, I have decided to issue a Public Interest Intervention Notice (PIIN).”
Earlier this year, Nandy declined to issue a PIIN for Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, despite a public plea from Benedict Cumberbatch, Benedict Wong, and Alan Cumming. However, the U.S. entities had a much smaller combined television market share in the U.K. than Sky and ITV, which are among the biggest broadcasters in the territory with a combined television advertising share of around 70%.
Former ITV chair Sir Peter Bazalgette told Variety earlier this year that he believes the deal will ultimately go through. “The reality of how the market operates is nothing to do with that,” he said, noting that the fragmentation of video advertising across digital platforms such as YouTube, Meta, and TikTok means Sky and ITV’s joint share drops to around 20 to 30% when those are taken into account.
There is also concern regarding the possibility of Sky combining its newsroom operations with ITV’s after ITV’s PSB license comes up for renewal at the end of 2034. At the Royal Television Society conference in September, Sky’s content chief Cecile Frot-Coutaz said Sky has made a “very public commitment to maintain Sky News and to maintain ITN news.” However, she refused to comment on whether that commitment will extend past 2034.
