Lachlan Murdoch and Bruce Gordon submitted a new bid to take over troubled Australian commercial broadcaster Ten this (Friday) morning.
Murcoch and Gordon’s investment vehicles, Illyria and Birketu, submitted the offer of Aus$55m (€37m/$44m) to KordaMentha, Ten’s administrators, after the Australian Senate passed changes to media laws that would have previously blocked a takeover of Ten by the media moguls.
KordaMentha will consider the offer over the weekend, according to the UK’s Guardian newspaper.
In the proposal, the executives said that the bid outlined a “single implementation path” and “lower transaction risk” than a previous offer they had submitted for Aus$35m.
“With the passage of the Media Reform Bill now assured, there are limited conditions to the revised proposal and a single execution path,” the executives’ advisory firm, Fort Street Advisory, wrote in a letter to Ten's administrators.
The initial deadline for bids was August 24.
KordaMentha, which is seeking advice on whether the fresh bid could be accepted beyond the deadline, has already recommended an offer from US network CBS for Ten.
Ten’s last major sports-rights deal came in June as it acquired rights to the A-League, the top tier of domestic football, as well as matches played by the men’s national team.