A company which collects royalties on behalf of Hollywood studios including The Walt Disney Company and Amazon-owned MGM is being put up for sale in an auction expected to fetch hundreds of millions of pounds.
Sky News has learnt that Motion Picture Licensing Company (MPLC), which is backed by private equity investors, is working with bankers at Guggenheim Securities on a sale.
A source close to one prospective bidder said they had been contacted to gauge their interest in a deal in recent days.
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MPLC, which describes itself as the leading global provider of audio-visual public performance licences, streamlines the process for companies and other organisations which want to legally display content in public places such as offices, transport hubs or pubs.
The company issues a permit known as a blanket licence, encompassing thousands of content-owners, meaning licensees can be certain they are complying with copyright laws.
Among the other rights-holders it represents are Marvel Studios, CNN, Dreamworks and NBCUniversal, which – like Sky News – is ultimately owned by New York-listed Comcast.
MPLC has been part-owned by Tenzing, a private equity firm, since 2019.
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Prospective bidders said they anticipated that a sale would be lucrative for its existing shareholders, with a valuation of several hundred million pounds.
The company was founded in 2004, and is based in Sussex.
Tenzing declined to comment.
