Despite some initial pushback from the European Commission, Amazon have announced on Friday that they will be moving forward with their deal to sign acclaimed film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for the amount of US$8.45 billion (roughly AU$11.45 billion.)
The EU regulators have refused to challenge the agreement, pointing out that it doesn’t constitute a violation of consumer law and would allow competition within the film and audio-visual industry to remain at a substantial level.
“The Commission found that MGM’s upstream activities as a producer and licensor of AV content are limited compared to other market players’ activities; MGM’s content cannot be considered as must-have; and a wide variety of alternative content exists,” the EC said, adding that “overall MGM is not among the top production studios, despite its rights over successful film franchises such as James Bond.”
The deal, which was initially announced back in May 2021, will see Amazon’s streaming service, Prime, add all 4,000 MGM films to its library, including last year’s Oscar-nominee “Licorice Pizza” and all of the studio’s James Bond films.
In a statement regarding the agreement, Amazon pointed out that all of the MGM employees will continue to work for the company and that none would be at risk of losing their position. Amazon Prime’s vice president, Mike Hopkins, extended a greeting to the MGM employees via a statement: “We welcome MGM employees, creators, and talent to Prime Video and Amazon Studios, and we look forward to working together.”
But despite the fact that the agreement has been given the green light by the EU, it has yet to be finalised, with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission keeping a keen eye on it. A representative of the independent agency pointed out that they may still challenge the deal if they “…determine it violates the law.”
