Overnight, Astral brand all but disappears

Media | 07/05/2013 7:15 pm EDT

BCE Inc. didn’t waste any time in absorbing the former Astral Media Inc. BCE, Canada’s largest vertically integrated communications and media company, formally gained control of Astral at 12:01 a.m. Friday, eight days after the CRTC gave its blessing to the company’s $3.38-billion acquisition of what was previously the country’s largest non-integrated broadcast company. As of Friday morning, Astral’s old website now redirects viewers to the webpage of BCE's Bell Media division. Twitter now says the company’s old account, @Astral, no longer exists,...

Indications of an ‘audacious’ Bell-Astral decision, analyst says

Media | 06/14/2013 8:49 pm EDT

Following the CRTC's wireless code decision last week, the regulator may make a second “audacious” regulatory decision on BCE Inc.’s proposed $3.38-billion acquisition of Astral Media Inc., Veritas Investment Research said. Veritas analysts Neeraj Monga and Desmond Lau, in a research note Thursday, referred to CRTC Chairman Jean-Pierre Blais' speech at the Banff World Media festival on Wednesday, where he said the regulator's decision making process will mean “sometimes being audacious” with intervention and in other cases taking a “step back” and deregulating. Blais “quoted Napoleon Bonaparte and said 'the art of sometimes...