Time Warner Willing to Cut Primestar Stake

Time Warner Chairman Gerald Levin said the media company is willing to reduce its interest in Primestar Inc. to help relieve U.S. government antitrust concern about the satellite television provider.

Primestar, which is owned by General Electric, Time Warner and several other cable TV companies, is looking for ways to reduce the control of the cable owners after the Justice Department sued last month to block its $1.1-billion purchase of the last valuable orbital slots from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.

Time Warner will do what is “in the best interests of Primestar. If that takes bringing down our interest, we’ll do that,” Levin said after a speech at the Town Hall Los Angeles forum.

Time Warner, together with Newhouse Broadcasting Corp., owns 30% of Primestar.

Under one scenario, News Corp., which would take a passive 10% position after a sale, and General Electric would each raise their stakes to 33%, with the cable industry reducing its stake accordingly. But that idea is losing steam.

In a separate move Thursday, Carl Vogel was named chairman and chief executive of the satellite service. Vogel was instrumental in the growth of EchoStar Communications, the nation’s third-ranked satellite service, where he was president until March 1997.