IMO Statement on Recent Developments in Proposed Outdoor Merger
OutdoorHub 03.14.13
Re: Recent Developments with IMO-Sportsman’s Proposed Outdoor Channel Merger
We believe our offer to merge Outdoor Channel into the industry leading multiplatform enterprise we have created with Sportsman Channel and InterMedia Outdoors (IMO) created enormous value for Outdoor Channel shareholders.
We continue to believe that our proposed merger was and is the superior choice for all Outdoor Channel shareholders.
Unfortunately, Outdoor Channel determined that they would prefer to take cash rather than participate in the significant combined future upside this combination provided. Outdoor Channel presented an attractive merger partner for us, but our first duty is to our investors and there are prices at which some deals stop making sense. As always, our primary priority is on continuing to improve our offerings to our consumers, sponsors, producers and cable and satellite distribution partners.
Sportsman Channel and IMO together represent the largest outdoor lifestyle media company in the world, and we plan to continue on our aggressive and innovative path of re-energizing and re-inventing the outdoors category for the millions of Americans who call themselves sportsmen and sportswomen. This represents a vibrant, passionate and growing audience who every day live the ‘sportsman’ lifestyle and who crave content across numerous outlets. Together, Sportsman and IMO deliver best-in-class content and editorial across TV, digital, radio, print and social outlets. This aggregated approach is fueling tremendous results and growth across every facet of our business including ratings, distribution, and social media. We are committed to a vision for a dynamic category that will only continue to grow, expand and succeed.
