HANDY MERGER SCORECARD
& CALENDAR

Break out the calendars and Palm Pilots—we've got all of the important regulatory dates for the impending giant mergers.

AOL/TIME-WARNER, WARNER MUSIC GROUP/EMI
The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, is in the process of taking an in-depth, four-month long look at these two proposed mergers. The EC is expected to rule on WMG/EMI on October 18, and on October 24 regarding AOL/TW. On those dates the Commission could decide to approve the mergers with or without conditions or it could block the mergers. The EC has indicated that music is the primary point of contention in terms of WMG/EMI, which begs the question, what are the bigwigs willing to give up in order to make the merger happen? In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission and Federal Communication Commission are expected to complete their reviews of the mergers by mid-October. Staffers were told at EMI Distribution's convention in August that the company expected to start announcing decisions in January 2001.

VIVENDI/SEAGRAM/CANAL PLUS
In Europe, where Vivendi has home-court advantage, the EC has until Oct. 2 to rule on whether to approve the merger or send it for a four-month in-depth investigation. On Wednesday (8/30) Canada's Competition Bureau approved the deal. On August 17, Seagram CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr. announced that the U.S. statutory waiting period expired without additional requests and "therefore the anti-trust clearance process in the U.S. is complete."

As long as you've got the calendars open, don't forget that Judge Jed Rakoff's ruling on the Universal Music Group suit against MP3.com. is expected Wendesday, Sept. 6 and oral arguments in the RIAA vs. Napster open the first week of October.

We swear that this is the last we're going to report on any of these things.