SiriusXM Still Interested In Pandora ‘At The Right Price’

Gregory Maffei, chairman of SiriusXM, has told some shareholders this week that the satellite radio company is still interested in buying Pandora, The NY Post has learned.

“Sirius would look at [Pandora] at the right price,” said a source familiar with conversations.

Greg Maffei

Maffei reached out to Pandora’s board late last year, according to a report at the time, sparking a 20 percent run-up in the streaming radio player’s shares, to $13.85.

But Pandora has given back most of that gain amid talk, as recently as last week, that SiriusXM’s interest had cooled.

But that is not the case, sources said — despite SiriusXM’s chief financial officer, David Frear, telling an audience at the Consumer Electronic Show on Jan. 5 that a offer for Pandora is “not likely.”

Maffei told investors at a private dinner on Tuesday — an event tied to the Lionsgate annual investor day in Englewood, Colo., that SiriusXM was still interested in money-losing Pandora, sources said.

Maffei, the chief executive of Liberty Media, which owns 66 percent of SiriusXM, told the investors that he was concerned about Pandora losing roughly $200 million a year and that Pandora was trying to launch On Demand services that compete with huge tech giants such as Amazon and Apple.