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NEW YORK - General Electric and Pearson may challenge Rupert Murdoch's US$5 billion ($6.7 billion) bid for Dow Jones, with a plan that could let Dow Jones' controlling family to keep an interest in the company, the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal today reported on their websites.
One option for GE and Pearson would be to allow the Bancroft family to keep a 20 per cent stake in the company, reported the Financial Times, which is published by Pearson.
Selling Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, to GE and Pearson, would be a better journalistic fit than Murdoch's News Corp, but there is "no rush" to examine the plan, an unidentified Bancroft family member told the Financial Times.
GE owns the CNBC business television channel, and will face competition from News Corp, which is launching a business news channel of its own.
Talks are at an early stage and could collapse or result in another structure for a Dow Jones bid, both papers reported.
Such a company would also include Dow Jones' Barron's investment newspaper, 50 per cent of the Economist magazine and interests in business newspapers in Russia, France, South Africa, India and Britain, the Journal reported.
A Bancroft family spokesman was not immediately available for comment.
Dow Jones also owns the Marketwatch.com business news website, the Factiva electronic news archive and Dow Jones Newswires, which compete with Reuters in providing business news.
Pearson has also sounded out Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp and privately held newspaper and magazine publisher Hearst Corp as partners, the Financial Times reported.
- REUTERS
