EchoStar Seeks Partners in Bid for Hughes

EchoStar Communications Corp. is reaching out to telephone companies as possible partners for a bid to buy rival satellite TV company Hughes Electronics Corp., sources familiar with the situation said Tuesday.

Such partnerships would give EchoStar deeper pockets to finance a possible bid for Hughes, which Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. has been pursuing doggedly to add to its Sky Global satellite TV network.

By backing an EchoStar bid for General Motors Corp.’s Hughes, telephone companies could gain TV and high-speed Internet offerings to better compete against cable operators.

SBC Communications Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. already offer Hughes’ DirecTV services to their local telephone service customers. BellSouth Corp. left the satellite TV business in December and transferred its subscribers to EchoStar’s Dish Network.

EchoStar shares fell 5%, or $1.70 to $32.32 on Nasdaq, and Hughes fell 3%, or 77 cents, to $23.91 on the New York Stock Exchange. News Corp. American depositary receipts closed at $37.10, down 50 cents.