Televisa

Lions Gate Entertainment Corp., the largest independent U.S. film studio, confirmed it would work with Grupo Televisa, the biggest Spanish-language broadcaster, to enter the Latin American market. The companies will co-produce films and television programs in the U.S. and in Mexico, Lions Gate Chief Executive Jon Feltheimer said. Terms of the agreement, reported last month by The Times, weren't disclosed.

Mexico's anti-monopoly watchdog, the Federal Competition Commission, said Monday that it had blocked broadcasting giant Televisa's proposed purchase of the country's top radio group, Grupo Acir Telecomunicaciones. The commission said competitors would be squeezed out of the market, especially in advertising. "The vote in the [commission's] plenum was unanimously against the buyout," a spokesman said.

Mexico City-based Grupo Televisa, the world's largest Spanish-language broadcaster, said it was deciding whether to make a bid for Univision Communications Inc. "I guess we are in the early stages of analyzing the different scenarios to determine whether it makes sense or not for us," Televisa Executive Vice President Alfonso de Angoitia said in a conference call with analysts.

Grupo Televisa, Mexico's largest TV network, plans to slash about 4,000 jobs, or 20% of its work force, by the end of September as part of a yearlong cost-cutting effort. The cuts, which will leave Televisa with about 17,000 employees, aim to achieve $60 million in annual cost reductions, executives said. That would add to $25 million in annual savings from layoffs during the first six months of the year. The latest cuts span all departments and seniority levels.

Grupo Televisa said it would not attempt to put together an 11th-hour bid to buy Univision Communications Inc., clearing the way for a Sept. 27 vote by shareholders on whether to sell the company for $12.3 billion to a consortium of private investors. Mexico City-based Televisa, which owns 11% of Univision, in June lost out in the bidding for the largest Spanish-language media company in the U.S. Univision is based in Century City. Shareholders are being asked to approve the $36.

A federal judge agreed Monday to delay a much-anticipated trial that would pit one giant of Spanish-language television, Mexico's Grupo Televisa, against another, Univision Communications Inc. Televisa sued Univision three years ago, alleging breach of contract and unpaid royalties. The Mexico City-based company has been seeking to terminate its long-term programming agreement with Univision, the dominant Spanish-language media company in the U.S.

Mexico's Grupo Televisa SAB said Tuesday it will invest $1.2 billion in New York-based Univision Communications in exchange for a minority stake, expanding cooperation between the Spanish-language media heavyweights. The deal brings an end to long-standing legal disputes between the companies, recently over privately held Univision's rights to distribute Televisa's programs online and to phones. It also helps Televisa strengthen its foothold in the U.S., an important market as the company works to widen its reach beyond Mexico.

A federal judge in Los Angeles on Friday handed Univision Communications a major victory in its hard-fought battle with its programming partner from Mexico, underscoring Univision's exclusive rights in the U.S. to the wildly popular Spanish-language soap operas that fuel its huge ratings. Grupo Televisa, Mexico's largest entertainment company, had sought the judge's permission to transmit to U.S.

Every morning during television coverage of the World Cup, on the Mexican equivalent of the "Today" show, co-hosts chat, trade barbs and yuck it up. Behind them, actors in blackface makeup, dressed in fake animal skins and wild "Afro" wigs, gyrate, wave spears and pretend to represent a cartoonish version of South Africa. Yes, in the 21st century, blackface characters on a major television network. But this is Mexico, and definitions of racism are complicated and influenced by the country's own tortured relationship with invading powers and indigenous cultures.

After years of acrimony, the hemisphere's two largest Spanish-language media companies have decided they need each other after all. Tuesday, Grupo Televisa of Mexico City said that it had provided Univision $1.2 billion in exchange for a 5% stake and notes that eventually could convert into an ownership interest of as much as 40% in the New York-based Latino media giant. Televisa also agreed to provide its highly popular telenovelas to Univision exclusively at least through 2020 ?