One of the more interesting nuggets out of this week's All Things Digital conference is media mogul Rupert Murdoch's admission to having buyout talks with TiVo (Nasdaq: TIVO) last year.
"It was a year ago and it was $100 million or something," the News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) chief said. He ultimately walked, feeling that the price was too high.
TiVo has never been a $100 million company. In fact, it's due to receive $94 million from Dish Network (Nasdaq: DISH) in its patent infringement victory. If TiVo -- a company with a roughly $860 million market cap -- is available for $100 million, let me make a few phone calls to drum up my own bid for the digital video recorder (DVR) pioneer.
In all seriousness, I don't expect Murdoch to remember every price tag that he's walked away from. The guy is a genius, and I felt that way even before he scooped up MySpace's parent company for a mere $580 million almost three years ago.
However, even if Murdoch's memory may be off on actual price tags, it is probably spot-on when it comes to his decision to walk away, based on valuation.
Big mistake, Murdoch.
Pull up a stock chart of both TiVo and News Corp. over the past year, and you'll see what I mean. Murdoch's media empire, like many other entertainment conglomerates, has gradually surrendered value over the past few quarters. TiVo, on the other hand, has seen its stock soar 40% higher during the past 12 months.
TiVo under Murdoch's arm would probably be worth even more, especially given News Corp.'s influence in key overseas markets where TiVo is just starting to grow its baby teeth.
There is little reason for TiVo to cash out these days. The company is striking juicy content and licensing deals with companies like Disney (NYSE: DIS), Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN), Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA), and RealNetworks (Nasdaq: RNWK). It even posted a surprisingly strong profit earlier this week. The lack of organic subscriber growth is the only rain cloud in the otherwise sunny sky.
This makes it all the more surprising for Murdoch to almost brag about having walked away from TiVo when it was likely trading substantially lower.
You're the man, Murdoch, but surely you must feel the tug of regret every once in a while.
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