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Comcast to buy GE's stake in NBC for $16.7 billion

The cable giant will now own all of NBCUniversal.

Donna Tam Staff Writer / News
Donna Tam covers Amazon and other fun stuff for CNET News. She is a San Francisco native who enjoys feasting, merrymaking, checking her Gmail and reading her Kindle.
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Comcast Corp. is going to buy all of General Electric's remaining stake in NBCUniversal for $16.7 billion, the cable giant announced today.

NBCUniversal will also buy its facilities at 30 Rockerfeller Plaza and CNBC's headquarters in New Jersey for $1.4 billion. The deal is expected to go through by the end of March.

Comcast already owns 51 percent of NBCUniversal since its purchase of the majority stake from GE went through in 2011. Comcast is the largest cable provider in the U.S.

Today's announcement comes well before the agreed deadline for Comcast to buy GE's remaining 49 percent stake in the network.

"The management team at GE has been a wonderful partner during the past two years and their support has been very valuable. Our decision to acquire GE's ownership is driven by our sense of optimism for the future prospects of NBCUniversal and our desire to capture future value that we hope to create for our shareholders," said Brian L. Roberts, chairman and CEO of Comcast. "We believe the terms of the transaction are attractive and have planned for this event by taking a number of financial steps to prepare our balance sheet. We believe we are in a strong and unique position to continue to grow and build value in our combined company."