Liberty Media Sues IAC Over Spin-Off Plan

By Alfred Branch, Jr.

Two months ago, rumors were circulating that Liberty Media was interested in acquiring Ticketmaster, and this week the media company may be trying to force Ticketmaster’s parent company IAC/InterActiveCorp to sell it to them.

The New York Times is reporting that Liberty Media is suing IAC over the company’s plan to spin off several of its divisions, including Ticketmaster. IAC announced the plan in November of last year and hoped to complete the move by the end of the year, despite lackluster support from financial analysts who are watching the deal.

At issue for Liberty Media, which owns a significant piece of IAC, is that under a complex formula it reportedly has a majority of the voting interests in IAC, but IAC’s CEO Barry Diller reportedly still controls how those votes are cast. Liberty Media is seeking unspecified damages in part because it believes IAC’s plan to spin off divisions would diminish Liberty’s voting power, according to The Times.

If Liberty Media truly wants to own Ticketmaster it could prove to be a prize for the company because Ticketmaster is already the world’s largest ticketing company, according to TicketNews’ exclusive rankings, and it recently made an aggressive bid for further its dominance by agreeing to buy secondary ticket seller TicketsNow.