News Corp Drops Bid To Purchase BSkyB

News Corp has been working to purchase the British pay-TV company BSkyB since last year. New Corp has now dropped its bid to purchase the British company after all three main political parties in Britain teamed up to call on Rupert Murdoch's company to cease its bid to buy the company. The loss of the deal is seen as a major blow to News Corps plans for expansion in the UK.

The proposed deal was worth £8bn and the cessation of talks for purchase concluded a year of negotiations. The fall through of the deal comes in the wake of the high-profile iPhone hacking revelation that journalists at News Corp. paper News of the World were hacking into iPhones to get information for stories.

News of the World was shut down after it was discovered that journalists there had hacked into a phone belonging to a teen that was murdered. News Corp. COO Chase Carey noted it had become clear the purchase would not happen in the current climate. Murdoch's company will have to pay BSkyB a fee of about £38.5m for backing out of the deal.

[via Guardian]