In 2018, which media company did AT&T acquire for $85.4 billion?

In 2018, AT&T acquired Time Warner for $85.4 billion.

The deal combined AT&T’s telecommunications and distribution networks with Time Warner’s major entertainment and news properties, including HBO, Warner Bros. and CNN. AT&T completed the acquisition on June 14, 2018, after a federal judge rejected the U.S. Justice Department’s attempt to block it.

Time Warner was renamed WarnerMedia after the purchase. The transaction was a frequently discussed example of vertical integration: AT&T supplied ways to deliver media, while Time Warner owned content to distribute. It was not the same type of deal as Disney’s acquisition of 21st Century Fox, which involved one major entertainment company buying another.

AT&T later separated WarnerMedia, combining it with Discovery in 2022 to create Warner Bros. Discovery. That later restructuring does not change the answer to the 2018 acquisition question.