While I think a 2degress & Vocus combination makes total sense with massive synergies, I still struggle to see where the large synergies are for 2 degrees/vocus to purchase sky.
sky is a horizontal service company now, meaning it wants its content distributed over as many networks as possible to reach as many people as possible as every additional subscriber is almost 100% margin accretive. This is evident in it’s deals with Vodafone and spark to resell sky content, and the fact neon & skysport and rugbypass are available to anyone on basically any device with an internet connection.
(Spark Sport is in the same situation, it needs as many subscribers as possible regardless of whether they are a spark customer or not - just like lightbox did - and spark sport doesn’t really add value to spark by way of large synergies, other than the opportunity to offer a slightly discounted bundle which in some situation makes margin worse - for instance if those subscribers were going to use both products anyway at full price)
The only vertical part of the sky business is the satellite distribution system, infrastructure which is worthless to 2degrees & vocus, other than being a short term cash cow in steady decline, and even the skybox product will move to an IP based system in the not so far away future - via both internet connected skyboxes and also the skygo streaming app becoming a standalone product - bringing the “vertical” satellite business infrastructure to an end.
Having said all that, this doesn’t mean vocus and/or 2degrees won’t consider a merger. Telecom companies adding content plays are commonplace, even though they usually don’t work out in the long term. Also, If Vocus/2degrees wants to consider itself an infratil-like company that will hold seperate businesses, then buying sky now at its low valuation is a great idea (as it would be for any other investment company.
Here is a piece describing how telecom companies buying content companies is usually a bad idea (in light of the last weeks abandonment of WarnerMedia by AT&T):
https://stratechery.com/2021/distribution-and-demand/