Sony on the brink of terminating $10 billion merger with Zee: The inside story of what went wrong over two years

Sony Group Corp is close to calling off its proposed $10 billion merger between its India operations with Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) – first announced two years ago in a bid to create India’s largest broadcast company — owing to what it sees as the inability of the latter to fulfil several conditions laid down in the merger agreement, two people aware of the development said.

The lapses in complying with what are called conditions precedents (CP) in legalese, has added to the simmering discontentment between the suitors, who thus far couldn’t agree on ZEEL MD Punit Goenka being the CEO of the merged entity, until he’s cleared of charges that he siphoned off money from the publicly-traded firm to closely held companies owned by his family’s Essel Group. The Goenka family owns 3.99% equity in ZEEL.