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EU Clears Launch of Internet Broadcaster

Posted on: Thursday, 21 June 2007, 09:02 CDT

BRUSSELS, Belgium - EU regulators on Thursday cleared media companies NBC Universal and News Corp. to launch an Internet broadcaster that aims to rival Google Inc.'s YouTube.

The European Commission approved the joint venture automatically after identifying no antitrust concerns and receiving no complaints from rivals.

The $100 million service due to launch this summer will offer streaming content from NBC and News Corp.'s television and film units that include the film studios Universal Pictures and Twentieth Century Fox and television stations CNBC, Telemundo, Fox and British Sky Broadcasting.

News Corp. also owns MySpace, the leading social networking site on the Internet.

Owner Rupert Murdoch recently made a bid for Dow Jones & Co., the publisher of The Wall Street Journal, that would expand his huge print empire. He also controls Britain's biggest selling newspaper, The Sun, as well as The Times and the New York Post.

NBC Universal is a unit of General Electric Co.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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