Liberty Media Corp. Chief Executive Greg Maffei, whose company controls satellite-radio operator Sirius XM Holdings Inc. hasn’t been very complimentary about music-streaming services in recent months.
“We have looked at the business models on a bunch of the streaming companies and found it very hard to see them [as] attractive,” Maffei told investors at a March conference.
Behind the scenes, however, the story is more complex, according to The Wall Street Journal. In recent months, Maffei floated an offer to acquire internet-radio company Pandora Media Inc. for roughly $15 a share, several dollars above where the shares traded at the time, said people familiar with the matter. The offer valued the company at over $3.4 billion.
Mr. Maffei’s approach didn’t have the characteristics of a formal bid, one of the people said, appearing to be more of “a fishing expedition.” Pandora’s board rebuffed the advance because it believed the company’s true value was closer to what it was in the fall, when the stock traded around $20, this person said.
Pandora shopped itself to other potential buyers, including Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., earlier this year, said other people familiar with the matter said.
Later, in June, at a private meeting with investors in Denver, Mr. Maffei talked up the benefits of a potential Sirius XM-Pandora tie-up, according to people who were there. Asked during the meeting why a deal had yet to be sealed, he told attendees, “You’d have to ask the Pandora board.”
Now investors are wondering whether Mr. Maffei will raise his bid—and what he might do if he won Pandora.
In an interview, Sirius XM Chief Executive Jim Meyer declined to comment on any takeover approach to Pandora, But he said that since his company represents a $5 billion part of the $25 billion radio business, he often kicks around whether he would like to have a bigger presence in the business.
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