The Justice Department on Monday filed a civil antitrust lawsuit seeking to block National CineMedia Inc.’s $375 million acquisition of Screenvision LLC, claiming the merger would eliminate competition in cinema advertising.
“The proposed combination of NCM and Screenvision is a bad deal for movie theaters, advertisers and consumers,” said Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer in a statement regarding the suit that was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. “This merger to monopoly is exactly the type of transaction the antitrust laws were designed to prohibit.
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“If this deal is allowed to proceed, the benefits of competition will be lost, depriving theaters and advertisers of options for cinema advertising network services and risking higher prices to movie goers,” he continued.