Negotiations between Ruport Murdoch's News Corp and General Motors are continuing over a takeover bid for DirecTV, but the GM board will not vote on the proposal at a regularly scheduled meeting later today.
The Los Angeles Times reports that top GM management will recommend that the automaker pursue the deal on offer under which News Corp would acquire GM's stake in Hughes Electronics, the parent company of DirecTV, the US satellite television service.
There are still outstanding issues between the two sides, but a deal could come together in the next month, the newspaper quoted an unnamed source as saying.
Under the deal, Murdoch's Sky Global Networks would take control of the merged satellite network with a 30 percent stake as the largest shareholder, the newspaper said.
The News Corp bid includes US$3 billion in cash from Microsoft. Hughes is a unit of General Motors, which owns 30 percent of its stock.
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that the GM board was expected to take up the revised offer from Murdoch at Tuesday's board meeting and the issue of whether formal negotiations should proceed.
