Sirius CFO Says Company Might Reject Merger Conditions

Frear Speaks Of Merger

SIRIUS SATELLITE RADIO CFO DAVID FREAR said TUESDAY that his company is prepared to reject some conditions that federal regulators might impose on its proposed merger with XM SATELLITE RADIO, reports CNN MONEY.

"The company won't do anything -- the company won't agree to a set of conditions that's going to adversely impact, and would not be to the benefit of, our current subscribers, our future subscribers, and our shareholders," FREAR said. "It's all got to make sense."

FREAR's comments come in the wake of speculation that the FCC will soon rule on the spectrum-license transfer that accompanies the merger. If the FCC refuses the transfer, the deal effectively will be killed.

FREAR described the negotiations with the FCC as a "tortured path" that represents one of many hurdles to the proposed merger, first announced in FEBRUARY, 2007. "The FCC process is in many ways a political process," he said. "There is a well-worn tradition of exploiting, of opportunistic parties looking to exploit the regulatory process of the FCC for what is their personal gain. In a week, we'll be 15 months into this for what is honestly, in the broader media landscape, an incredibly unimportant public policy decision."

« see more Net News